For Sylvia
An homage
She lingers, a shadow cast
in the hollow corners of my mind, pale
fingers, brittle as autumn leaves,
press against my temples, seeping
into the marrow of my words — each
syllable knotted in grief, tangled
like spider silk across the page.
Her voice hums behind me, sharp
as the crackle of winter’s frostbite,
whispering the unsaid, the undone,
the half-sown promises buried in the soil
of unturned years. I reach for her —
to catch the remnants of her breath
in mine, inhale her ache
like cigarette smoke, let it fill
the lungs of my sentences — heavy,
heavy as stone sinking
in a deep well of silence.
She is the ghost
I’ve inherited, a daughter
of her haunting, her bones woven
through the sinew of my syntax, her eyes
watching over every line, judging
the strength of the fragility
I dare to call my own.
And yet, she stays with me, still,
a flicker in the half-light
where words stumble and fall.
Her shadow never leaves —
it slips between the cracks
of verse and air, leaving behind
the echo of a woman
who was never meant
to be quiet, even
in death.
This poem is an homage to Sylvia Plath, the Mother of my confessional writing style. She is a literary legend, trailblazer, and inspiration to the legion of writers who toil and have toiled in her shadow. Avec mon amour.
