How to Love
Sylvia Plath

 

Reach into a thicket  
and grab a thorny rose.  
Feel the pain and write,
cry out your dark prose.

Remember her lines
are more than words.
Ask yourself
what she didn’t say.

Give her love and more love
enough to take to the grave,
for you do not know
the fruits she bears.

Dream, dream  
your dark dream
and hope the fall of sunlight
softens its edges.

                              —Mike Bayles

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