MirrorBy Sylvia

Plath

Sylvia Plath was born on October

27, 1932 and died on February 11th, 1963. She was an American novelist,

poet and short story writer.

Mirror  I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.Whatever I see, I swallow immediately.Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislikeI am not cruel, only truthful –The eye of a little god, four-cornered.Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so longI think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.Faces and darkness separate us over and over. Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me.Searching my reaches for what she really is.Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.I see her back, and reflect it faithfullyShe rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.I am important to her. She comes and goes.Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old womanRises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.

Sylvia Plath’s poem “Mirror” reflects many different ideas and thoughts. Her poem is dark, full of unhappiness, and only views the world from a pessimistic perspective. Given Sylvia Plath’s background it is understandable that the poem is full of dark ideas and wild nightmares. Sylvia Plath writes many more poems like “Mirror” Sylvia Plath uses imagery, personification, metaphors, and greatly shows a shift to express all of her emotions she intended to be put into the poem.

This poem is very engaging. Although poetry is beautiful in many ways it can be dark and saddening at times. In this poem there is one speaker although the speaker takes on different forms. In the beginning of the poem the speaker is a women looking into a mirror. "I am silver and exact“ It's almost as the reflection starts out perfect, "I have no preconceptions" .

In the poem, it tells us about a lady who dislikes the way she looks. She thinks of herself as being ugly.

STANZA TWO

“Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me.Searching my reaches for what she really is.Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.I am important to her. She comes and goes.Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old womanRises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.”

In stanza two the mirror becomes a perfectly reflecting lake. A woman bends over the lake, but no matter how deeply she searches she sees only her actuality. Sylvia can not fall in love with what she sees and she doesn’t like herself at all.

• Throughout the poem the mirror is shown as an arrogant object. The metaphor of mirror being “the eye of a little god” is sustained throughout the poem signifying the power it has. “I am important to her. She comes and goes.” states the value of the mirror for the woman and indicates that the woman is addicted to the mirror to the point where she’s searching “for what she really is” in the mirror, despite the fact that the mirror is cruel and blunt. This again gives power to the mirror.

The mirror also represents itself as “not cruel, only truthful”, “faithful”, honest and reliable. This eventually becomes too honest and too blunt for the woman and “she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon” for a distorted image of herself in order to not see her ageing in the soft focus.