Winter Trees

The wet dawn inks are doing their blue dissolve.

On their blotter of fog the trees

Seem a  botanical drawing -

Memories growing, ring on ring,

A series of weddings,

Knowing neither abortions nor bitchery,

Truer than women,

They seed so effortlessly!

Tasting the winds, that are footless,

Waist-deep in history –

Full of wings, otherworldliness.

Is this, they are Ledas,

O mother of leaves and sweetness

Who are these pietas?

The shadows of ringdoves chanting but easing nothing.

Sylvia Plath

Sylvia Plath (October 27, 1932 – February 11, 1963) was an American poet, novelist and short story writer. Born in Massachusetts, she studied at Smith College and Newnham College, Cambridge before receiving acclaim as a professional poet and writer. She married fellow poet Ted Hughes in 1956 and they lived together first in the United States and then England, having two children: Frieda and Nicholas. Following a long struggle with depression and a marital separation, Plath committed suicide in 1963. 

Controversy continues to surround the events of her life and death, as well as her writing and legacy. Plath is credited with advancing the genre of confessional poetry and is best known for her two collections The Colossus and Other Poems and Ariel. In 1982, she became the first poet to win a Pulitzer Prize posthumously for The Collected Poems. She also wrote The Bell Jar, a semi-autobiographical novel published shortly before her death.