Sheep In Fog

“Child” by Sylvia Plath (1963)

According to her notes, “Child” was written on the same day in January 1963 that Plath revised “Sheep in Fog.” This poem describes Plath’s son, whom she hopes to keep as a “stalk without wrinkle” (Line 7). She hopes the child’s “clear eye” (Line 1) will see “images [. . .] grand and classical (Lines 8-9) rather than the “wringing of hands, this dark / Ceiling without a star” (Lines 11-12). Plath uses similar techniques here as in “Sleep in Fog”: employing tercets, contrasting lighter images with darker ones, and a closing finale which concentrates on a night-time sky without illumination.

“Words” by Sylvia Plath (1963)

Written 10 days before her suicide, this poem deals an argument in which “words” (Line 16) were used like “[a]xes” (Line 1). Written at the same time as when “Sheep in Fog” was revised, this poem employs several images that correlate. In “Words,” the “[e]choes” (Line 4) of the painful exchange “trave[l] / Off from the center like horses” (Line 5), much as the “horse” (Line 6) quietly moves through Plath’s other foggy landscape. The “white skull eaten by weedy greens” (Lines 12-13) reflects the “bones [that] hold a stillness” (Line 11) in “Sheep in Fog.