Sylvia Plath Quotes

The gloom encroaches upon my mind, and my heart flutters like a bird held fast in a fist.

I am terrified by this dark thing That sleeps in me; All day I feel its soft, feathery turnings, its malignity.

I am terrified by this dark thing that sleeps in me.

O how the darkness do crowd up, one against the other, in ye hearts! What fear ye more that what ye have wroughten?

Yes, I know it. In the darkness of my dark beating heart, I know. He'd have loved it alright. You see? Even Death Has A Heart.

Within my heart is lurking suspicion, and base fear, and shame and hate; but above all, tyrannous love sits throned, crowned with her graces, silent and in tears.

Now the standard cure for one who is sunk is to consider those in actual destitution or physical suffering—this is an all-weather beatitude for gloom in general and fairly salutary day-time advice for everyone. But at three o’clock in the morning, a forgotten package has the same tragic importance as a death sentence, and the cure doesn’t work—and in a real dark night of the soul it is always three o’clock in the morning, day after day.

Beware the dark pool at the bottom of our hearts. In its icy, black depths dwell strange and twisted creatures it is best not to disturb.

My life would be constrained by the horror and fierce rage that my appearance inspired, but I would know peace as well as fear, tenderness as well as brutality, and even love in a time of cruelty.

I had learned early to assume something dark and lethal hidden at the heart of anything I loved. When I couldn't find it, I responded, bewildered and wary, in the only way I knew how: by planting it there myself.

The Loneliness One dare not sound -- And would as soon surmise AS in its Grave go plumbing To ascertain the size -- The Loneliness whose worst alarm Is lest itself should see -- And perish from before itself For just a scrutiny -- The Horror not to be surveyed -- But skirted in the Dark -- With Consciousness suspended -- And Being under Lock -- I fear me this -- is Loneliness -- The Maker of the soul Its Caverns and its Corridors Illuminate -- or seal

My heart beats, echoes into the cold streets where nightmares and darkness begin to meet.

Sometimes I think there's a beast that lives inside me, in the cavern that's where my heart should be, and every now and then it fills every last inch of my skin, so that I can't help but do something inappropriate. Its breath is full of lies; it smells of spite.

It is true that I am a person with black pockets of evil and hatred in my heart. There are underground places inside of me

...he was leaving me. I wondered if I should stop him. If I should wrestle him to the ground and force him to love me. I wanted to hold his shoulders down and shout into his face.

Iain didn't go back to sleep for a long while. He continued to think about all the logical reasons he would never allow himself to be turned into a lovesick weakling like Patrick, and when he finally fell asleep, he had convinced himself that he would distance his heart from his mind. He dreamed about her.

I'm not trying to imply I can keep up this silent, isolated facade all the time. Sometimes the wall I've erected around me comes crumbling down. It doesn't happen very often, but sometimes, before I even realize what's going on, there I am--naked and defenseless and totally confused. At times like that I always feel an omen calling out to me, like a dark, omnipresent pool of water. ~page 10

In the depths of every heart, there is a tomb and a dungeon, though the lights, the music, and revelry above may cause us to forget their existence, and the buried ones, or prisoners whom they hide. But sometimes, and oftenest at midnight, those dark receptacles are flung wide open. In an hour like this, when the mind has a passive sensibility, but no active strength; when the imagination is a mirror, imparting vividness to all ideas, without the power of selecting or controlling them; then pray that your grieves may slumber, and the brotherhood of remorse not break their chain.

I'm just one gigantic ball of rancid fear and self-consciousness. I'm entirely fueled by fear, so the fact that I knew it could be a catastrophic disaster made me unable to sleep, and made me work quite hard.

And so I leave this world, where the heart must either break or turn to lead (suicide note)

Hence, viper thoughts, that coil around my mind,Reality's dark dream!I turn from you, and listen to the wind,Which long has raved unnoticed.

I can't sleep, I can't eat, I can't do anything but think about him. At night I dream of him, all day I wait to see him, and when I do see him my heart turns over and I think I will faint with desire.

In his dream she was sick and he cared for her. The dream bore the look of sacrifice but he thought differently. He did not take care of her and she died alone somewhere in the dark and there is no other dream nor other waking world and there is no other tale to tell.

Don't open that door," she said. "The hallway is full of difficult dreams." And I asked her: "How do you know?" And she told me: "Because I was there a moment ago and I had to come back when I discovered I was sleeping on my heart.

Oshima's silent for a time as he gazes at the forest, eyes narrowed. Birds are flitting from one branch to the next. His hands are clasped behind his head. "I know how you feel," he finally says. "But this is something you have to work out on your own. Nobody can help you. That's what love's all about, Kafka. You're the one having those wonderful feelings, but you have to go it alone as you wander through the dark. Your mind and body have to bear it all. All by yourself.