I am vertical

But I would rather be horizontal.

I am not a tree with my root in the soil

sucking up minerals and motherly love

so that each March I may gleam into leaf,

nor am I the beauty of a garden bed

attracting my share of Ahs and spectacularly painted,

unknowing I must soon unpetal.

Compared with me, a tree is immortal

and a flower-head not tall, but more startling,

and I want the one’s longevity and the other’s daring.

 

Tonight, in the infinitesimal light of the stars,

the trees and flowers have been strewing their cool odors.

i walk among them, but none of them are noticing.

sometimes I think that when I am sleeping

I must most perfectly resemble them–

thoughts gone dim.

It is more natural to me, lying down.

then the sky and I are in open conversation,

and I shall be useful when I lie down finally:

then the trees may touch me for once,

and the flowers have time for me.

 

Sylvia Plath

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