Poppies In July
Little poppies, little hell flames,
Do you no harm?
You flicker. I cannot touch you.
I put my hands among the flames. Nothing burns.
And it exhausts me to watch you
Flickering like that, wrinkly and clear red, like the skin of a mouth.
A mouth just bloodied.
Little bloody skirts!
There are fumes that I cannot touch.
Where are your opiates, your nauseous capsules?
If I could bleed, or sleep!---
If my mouth could marry a hurt like that!
Or your liquors seep into me, in this glass capsule,
Dulling and Stilling
But colourless. Colourless.
Sylvia Plath
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