Crossing the Water

Some claim that the enormous interest in Sylvia Plath’s poetry has more to do with the drama of her life, marriage, and death than with the quality of the poetry itself. That may be true, but it says nothing about the quality. Crossing the Water is solid; unlike Winter Trees, the other volume that collects poems she left behind, not a single one seems unfinished. All are well-crafted yet seem less formal than those in her first collection, The Colossus. They abound in memorable lines and internal rhyme. Plath is a masterful observer of landscape, which not only abounds in life but in intimations of death. “Wuthering Heights,” the opening poem, begins: “The horizons ring me like faggots,” a menacing image. “If I pay the roots show more of heather / Too close attention, they will invite me / To whiten my bones among them.” The combination of landscape and death recurs in other poems, such as “I Am Vertical.” Another motif that appears more than once is “blue Mary,” along with other religious imagery. At times I felt that Plath was creating poems meant to be read together, as a set, rather than individual lyrics. While reading the book, I learned that some figured in her plan for the Ariel collection, but that Ted Hughes disregarded her intention when he issued it, both in the selection of poems and their order. I don’t intend to join Team Hughes or Team Plath, but I’m sorry he did this, whatever his reasons. Regardless, this is an excellent collection. show less

Crossing the Water by Sylvia Plath is the collection between The Colossus and before the publication of Ariel, and it continues to push the envelop between dark and light. Plath has come to represent the dichotomy of dark and light in all of us, with our deep passions and desires that lie in tension with our duty to family and society. In this collection, the water becomes a metaphor for the surface veneer that many of us carry, but Plath examines how easily this surface can be shaken and disturbed.

In “Finisterre,” “Now it is only gloomy, a dump of rocks–/Leftover soldiers from old, messy wars./The sea cannons into their ear, but they don’t budge./Other rocks hide their grudges under the water.//” (page 15) Plath examines show more the aging process and the grudges carried from the past into the present and how that sullies the outside like the weathering of a rock face. The poem further flourishes into a series of worshiping people looking to that which is beyond themselves, particularly the larger “Lady of the Shipwrecked” who admires the sea as the man worships her and the peasant worships the sailor.

Read the full review: http://savvyverseandwit.com/2013/04/crossing-the-water-by-sylvia-plath.html show less

Crossing the Water by Sylvia Plath is the collection between The Colossus and before the publication of Ariel, and it continues to push the envelop between dark and light. Plath has come to represent the dichotomy of dark and light in all of us, with our deep passions and desires that lie in tension with our duty to family and society. In this collection, the water becomes a metaphor for the surface veneer that many of us carry, but Plath examines how easily this surface can be shaken and disturbed. - from another review

I always come back to 'In Plaster' and 'Mirror'. Such a stunning collection. It's not really fair to compare it to Ariel. It is where she was at that time.

"Mirror" stuck out to me the most, the others not so much.