Ariel: The Restored Edition

“If the moon smiled, she would resemble you.You leave the same impression Of something beautiful, but annihilating.”

“Out of the ash I rise with my red hairand I eat men like air.”

“Is it the sea you hear in me?Its dissatisfactions?Or the voice of nothing, that was your madness?Love is a shadow. How you lie and cry after it.--from "Elm", written 19 April 1962”

“I have taken a pill to killThe thinPapery feeling.--from "Cut", written 24 October 1962”

“Now I am silent, hateUp to my neck,Thick, thick.I do not speak.--from "Lesbos", written 18 October 1962”

“I used to pray to recover you.--from "Daddy", written 12 October 1962”

“There is a chargeFor the eyeing of my scars, there is a chargeFor the hearing of my heart - It really goes.And there is a charge, a very large charge,For a word or a touchOr a bit of bloodOr a piece of my hair or my clothes.--from "Lady Lazarus", written 23-29 October 1962”

“You smile.No, it is not fatal.--from "The Other", written 2 July 1962”

“Every woman adores a Fascist,The boot in the face, the bruteBrute heart of a brute like you.”

“I am still raw.I say I may be back.You know what lies are for.Even in your Zen heaven we shan't meet.--from "Lesbos", written 18 October 1962”

“I know the bottom, she says. I know it with my great tap root: It is what you fear.I do not fear it: I have been there.”

“Ash, ash —-You poke and stir.Flesh, bone, there is nothing there——A cake of soap,A wedding ring,A gold filling.Herr God, Herr LuciferBewareBeware.Out of the ashI rise with my red hairAnd I eat men like air.”

“A ring of gold with the sun in it?Lies. Lies and a grief.”

“I'm doped and thick from my last sleeping pill.”

“The sun gives you ulcers, the wind gives you T.B.Once you were beautiful.”

“All night your moth-breathFlickers among the flat pink roses. I wake to listen.A far sea moves in my ear.--from "Morning Song", written 19 February 1961”

“This is what it is to be complete. It is horrible.”

“I am only thirtyAnd like the cat I have nine times to die.This is Number Three.What a trashTo annihilate each decadeWhat a million filaments.The peanut-crunching crowdShoves in to see”

“And we, too, had a relationship—Tight wires between us,Pegs too deep to uproot, and a mind like a ringSliding shut on some quick thing,The constriction killing me also.”

“All the gods know is destinations.”

“This is a case without a body.The body does not come into it at all.”

“Dying Is an art, like everything else. I do it exceptionally well.”

“Nobody watched me before, now I am watched.The tulips turn to me, and the window behind meWhere once a day the light slowly widens and slowly thins,And I see myself, flat, ridiculous, a cut-paper shadowBetween the eye of the sun and the eyes of the tulips,And I have no face, I have wanted to efface myself.The vivid tulips eat my oxygen.”

“My body is a pebble to them, they tend it as waterTends to the pebbles it must run over, smoothing them gently.They bring me numbness in their bright needles, they bring me sleep.Now I have lost myself I am sick of baggage—My patent leather overnight case like a black pillbox,My husband and child smiling out of the family photo;Their smiles catch onto my skin, little smiling hooks.”

“There is a green in the air,Soft, delectable.It cushions me lovingly.”

“I am terrified by this dark thing That sleeps in me; All day I feel its soft, feathery turnings, its malignity.”

“I cannot undo myself, and the train is steaming.”

“The moon, also, is merciless: she would drag me Cruelly, being barren. Her radiance scathes me. Or perhaps I have caught her. I let her go. I let her go”

“I am inhabited by a cry.Nightly it flaps outLooking, with its hooks, for something to love.”

“Yüksek alakalarınızı küçümsüyorum sanmayın.Karıştırıp durduğunuzKüller, küller -Et, kemik, yok orada başka bir şey -”