Anne Sexton Poems on Water (24 Poems)

Hurry Up Please It’s Time (Anne Sexton Poems)

What is death, I ask. What is life, you ask. I give them both my buttocks, my two wheels rolling off toward Nirvana. They are neat as a wallet, opening and closing on their coins, the quarters, the nickels, straight … Continue reading →

Briar Rose (Sleeping Beauty) (Anne Sexton Poems)

Considera girl who keeps slipping off,arms limp as old carrots,into the hypnotist’s trance,into a spirit worldspeaking with the gift of tongues.She is stuck in the time machine,suddenly two years old sucking her thumb,as inward as a snail,learning to talk again.She’s … Continue reading →

Live (Anne Sexton Poems)

Live or die, but don’t poison everything… Well, death’s been here for a long time — it has a hell of a lot to do with hell and suspicion of the eye and the religious objects and how I mourned … Continue reading →

For the Year of the Insane (Anne Sexton Poems)

a prayer O Mary, fragile mother, hear me, hear me now although I do not know your words. The black rosary with its silver Christ lies unblessed in my hand for I am the unbeliever. Each bead is round and … Continue reading →

Clothes (Anne Sexton Poems)

Put on a clean shirtbefore you die, some Russian said.Nothing with drool, please,no egg spots, no blood,no sweat, no sperm.You want me clean, God,so I’ll try to comply. The hat I was married in,will it do?White, broad, fake flowers in … Continue reading →

Cockroach (Anne Sexton Poems)

Roach, foulest of creatures, who attacks with yellow teeth and an army of cousins big as shoes, you are lumps of coal that are mechanized and when I turn on the light you scuttle into the corners and there is … Continue reading →

The Nude Swim (Anne Sexton Poems)

On the southwest side of Capriwe found a little unknown grottowhere no people were and weentered it completelyand let our bodies lose alltheir loneliness. All the fish in ushad escaped for a minute.The real fish did not mind.We did not … Continue reading →

The Author Of The Jesus Papers Speaks (Anne Sexton Poems)

In my dreamI milked a cow,the terrible udderlike a great rubber lilysweated in my fingersand as I yanked,waiting for the moon juice,waiting for the white mother,blood spurted from itand covered me with shame.Then God spoke to me and said:People say … Continue reading →

Rumpelstiltskin (Anne Sexton Poems)

Inside many of us is a small old man who wants to get out. No bigger than a two-year-old whom you’d call lamb chop yet this one is old and malformed. His head is okay but the rest of him … Continue reading →

Flee On Your Donkey (Anne Sexton Poems)

Because there was no other place to flee to, I came back to the scene of the disordered senses, came back last night at midnight, arriving in the thick June night without luggage or defenses, giving up my car keys … Continue reading →