FROM OUR BODIES FLOWERS WILL GROW

120 x 90 cm

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 the 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:
 Then the trees may touch me for once, and the flowers have time for me.

Sylvia Plath