Spinster

Now this particular

During a ceremonious april

With her latest

Found herself, of a sudden, intolerably

By the bird's irregular

And the leaves' litter.

By this tumult afflicted,

Observed her lover's gestures unbalance the air,

His gait stray

Through a rank wilderness of fern and flower;

She judged petals in disarray,

The whole season, sloven.

How she longed for winter then!-Scrupulously austere in its

Of white and

Ice and rock; each sentiment within border,

And heart's frosty

Exact as a snowflake.

But here - a

Unruly enough to pitch her five queenly

Into vulgar motley-A treason not to be borne; let

Reel giddy in bedlam spring;

She withdrew neatly.

And round her house she

Such a barricade of barb and

Against mutinous

As no mere insurgent man could hope to

With curse, fist,

Or love, either.

A French translation of this poem with the title Celibataire can be found elsewhere on the classical poetry section of

Plath