Author of the Month: Sylvia Plath

Sylvia Plath was an American poet and author. Born on October 27th 1932 in Boston, Massachusetts, not too much is known about her childhood. It is said that she was a talented writer from early ages; she published her first poem at the age of 8 for the Boston Herald. However, this time also proves to have been ridden with much hardship, as she lost of father at a similar time period, causing a multitude of financial hardships for her family. Plath, a somewhat perfectionist, continued to publish many of her works. However, this perfectionism often caused some mental hardships for her in relation to her publishing. At the young age of 30, Plath died by suicide on February 11 after inhaling natural gas by putting her head in her oven. One of her most well-known works, featured today, is called Edge — the last poem she ever wrote before her death. Her death sparked much attention, even causing many riffs and people using her name within other forms of art, such as the music artist Salvia Palth.

Mirror

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions. / Whatever I see I swallow immediately / Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike. / I am not cruel, only truthful — / The eye of a little god, four-cornered. / Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall. / It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long / I think it is part of my heart. But it flickers. / Faces and darkness separate us over and over. / Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me, / Searching my reaches for what she really is. / Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon. / I see her back, and reflect it faithfully. / She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands. / I am important to her. She comes and goes. / Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness. / In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman / Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.

The issue also prints Edge and Lady Lazarus in full; both are reproduced on page five of the issue reader.