The first time I read Sylvia Plath I was immediately struck by her poetry. Here was a woman who had something to say, a message to communicate. The poetry was complex enough that I initially, had no idea what that message was; however, as I continued to read it became less murky. Plath was fascinated by both and desirous of her own death! I had already known that she was a suicide victim and that (due in no small part to this assignment) much of her writing focused upon the subject of death, but I never dreamed that she would compose verses about her own desire to kill herself so openly. Naturally, I could not resist writing about the poetry of such a strange, and somewhat disturbed author.

While I read many poems first, the most initially striking I have yet to come across is “Metaphors.” It did not impact me because of any blatant symbolism, or radical views. In fact, the first time I read it, I understood nothing at all. But then, the second time I read it, I picked up on something in the first line. Plath says “I am a riddle in nine syllables.” Notice anything strange? Let me give you a hint, count the syllables. That’s right. Each line of the nine line poem has nine syllables. As soon as I saw this I had to learn more about it, so naturally I turned to the internet. As it turns out, The most widely accepted interpretation of the poem is one revolving around Plath’s pregnancy during her composition of the work. This offers an obvious explanation for her infatuation with the number nine (as in nine months carrying the baby), as well as the many metaphors that express the idea of something beautiful and better within; however, there is still something more to the poem than a mere pregnancy tale.

Almost anyone who hears the words “poem about pregnancy” thinks about happy mothers with happy babies in a happy world. Almost anyone who reads “Metaphors” will not come away with this sense. The feeling of the poem is quite the opposite, in fact. Plath conveys a sense of foreboding and inevitability, that leaves one feeling oppressed by the weight of the world. She accomplishes this with a subtle use of pejorative self-description. According to her, Plath is “An elephant, a ponderous house” and “a melon strolling on two tendrils.” She then follows this self-depiction with the line “O red fruit, ivory, fine timbers!” in order to comment on the splendid gift of child that waits within her; however, in each of her metaphors for child-bearing it is important to consider what she becomes without the child. An elephant without its ivory is a mass of worthless gray skin and flesh. A house without its fine timbers is a crumbling foundation. A melon without its meat is a useless dry inedible rind. By using these example’s Plath is commenting on her own negative self-image. She sees herself as nothing more than an incubator for the next generation, to be thrown away after it has served its purpose.

Plath was tough though. She was not going to give into a fate she perceived to be inevitable. The last two lines of her poem indicate this lack of acceptance: “I’ve eaten a bag of green apples, boarded the train there’s no getting off.” By explicitly stating that she has done these things, Plath is enforcing the point that she has made a choice, an irreversible one. What that dark choice was did not become clear to me until I read another of her poems.

The poem in question, “ I Am Vertical”, is far easier to comprehend than “Metaphors.” In it, she communicates her desires by differentiating herself from what she sees to be as a “perfect nature.” She says that she wants the tree’s longevity and the flower’s nerve but makes the point that she has neither. She wants to “Gleam into leaf” and attract her “share of Ahs” from the general world. In fact, she is so complementary of nature and contrasts herself so much towards it, that we, the readers, begin to feel a sense of self-loathing from Plath.

After we get this sense, Plath then paints a picture of her walking through the forest at night, surrounded by her ideal nature. With most poets, this would be a scene of pure joy. They would relish in the perfection that is nature, but not with Plath. She sees it as a scene that throws her into even starker contrast with nature. The scene she depicts is one in which she does not belong, no matter how strongly she wants to. According to her, the only way she can be truly a part of it, the only way the trees will “touch her” and the flowers will “have time for her,” is when she is horizontal.

When we realize this, it becomes abundantly clear that vertical and horizontal are representations of life and death. Vertical is standing upright and alive, while horizontal is lying in a grave, dead. And, Plath wants to be horizontal more than anything. She wants to be dead.

When I realized that the poet was expressing her death with a fervent longing, the meaning “Metaphors” became illuminated. Coupled with Plath’s self-deprecating descriptions, eating the bag of green apples and boarding the train that she can’t get off of represent her decision to commit suicide, her self-inflicted and irreversible decision to kill herself. In fact, it was shortly after “Metaphors” was written that Plath’s depression was observed to worsen. Apparently she attempted suicide multiple times after it was written, until her final successful attempt in 1963.

I Am Vertical

But I would rather be horizontal.
I am not a tree with my root in the soil
Sucking up minerals and motherly love
So that each March I may gleam into leaf,
Nor am I the beauty of a garden bed
Attracting my share of Ahs and spectacularly painted,
Unknowing I must soon unpetal.
Compared with me, a tree is immortal
And a flower-head not tall, but more startling,
And I want the one's longevity and the other's daring.

Tonight, in the infinitesimal light of the stars,
The trees and flowers have been strewing their cool odors.
I walk among them, but none of them are noticing.
Sometimes I think that when I am sleeping
I must most perfectly resemble them--
Thoughts gone dim.
It is more natural to me, lying down.
Then the sky and I are in open conversation,
And I shall be useful when I lie down finally:
The the trees may touch me for once, and the flowers have time for me.

Since a train and a bag of green apples are so important to the poetry…