Your face broods from my table, Suicide.
Your force came on like a torrent toward the end
of agony and wrath.
You were christened in the beginning Sylvia Plath
and changed that name for Mrs Hughes and bred
and went on round the bend

till the oven seemed the proper place for you.
I brood upon your face, the geography of grief,
hooded, till I allow
again your resignation from us now
though the screams of orphaned children fix me anew.
Your torment here was brief,

long falls your exit all repeatingly,
a poor exemplum, one more suicide,
to stack upon the others
till stricken Henry with his sisters & brothers
suddenly gone pauses to wonder why he
alone breasts the wronging tide.

Analysis, meaning and summary of John Berryman's poem Dream Song 172: Your face broods

2 Comments

  1. ruth e maple says:

    i posted a comment here on monday 06/06/05 which was very extensive.it doesnt seem to be here, how disappointing. i was interested to find a poem about sylvia plath. having studied her work for more than twenty years it was wonderful to read a poets view point of her life and works, and what a powerful poem.

  2. Mcgomi says:

    wow! great job it’s brillant!, masterful, awesome!, totally!, tight!, all that and a bag of chips!!!!!!!!!!

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