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sylvia plath's poems revise, 'Mirror' - sylvia plath was born…

- - - - imageyr of 'silver and exact' form and colour of the mirror
  - - - the mirror is an eye of a 'little god'
        
        ironic description of greatness and smallest, the thing about reflective things are limited in what they can reflect, if put something behind the mirror, can't see it. Mirror can only reflect the surface, cannot read throughs, many limitations to its power, most hours of the day, no one uses the mirror,
  - - - the 'speckles' could also be splashes of blood of spots and spoils in the wall paint. there is no way to be sure.
        
        the mirror stares/ medirates at this wall for so long that it has become a part of its heart. becomes emotionally attached to the wall. the mirror might think that it has become part of the wall, or the wall has become part of it.
        
        this mirror has swallowed this pink wall, and become part of it, like whatevr humans eat becomes part of us. and what we listen to we will eventually become and reflect.
  - - - theme of appearance vs relaity. whats on the outside vs whats in the inside.
      - how did the woman change from the pink room to the lake.
        
        possibly there is no lake, she is still in the pink room but now is searching for herselfl in it, she starts to delude herself that there is some depth / insight that can be found in the mirror. in her mind she is looking in a 'lake' - > could call this hyperbole and metpahor. methaphr because the mirror now takes the quality and depth the lake has, hyperbole because the mirror is said to be much bigger and powerful than itself.
  - - - or, if there is no lake, the 'agitation of the hands' and splashing of the lake could be metaphocally be reflecting the smashing of the mirror because it reflects her as she is, she is frustrated, disspointed, angry, she is getting older, she is losing her beauty, she can't stop the passage of time, there is so much preasure for women to stay young and attrative in the male domainat society, even when educated well, her looks are critical in how people judge her.
      - the woman staring in the lake and smashing the glass, water could be alkuding to the narcism myth who becomes obessed and conseuqnelty frustrated with their beauty and loss of it. paying too much attention on how one looks is dangerous.
  - - - "each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness" - > could be alluding to snow white to 'mirror mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all' - this mirror relfects what it sees
  - - - just as the old woman is trying to escape her desintiy of ineveitbale death parallels to the biblical joana who tries to escape his dsestinty and was consuwntly swallowed by a 'terrbile fish'
        
        the message of this poem might ultimatley be that we must accept the authority of time, the path to our destinies, we shoudl accept this fact of life, (a much bigger god is time.)
        
        structure of the poem: free verse, no rhyme scheme nothing fantasy, reflects how structured and straight the mirror is, does not sugarcoat anything. 2 stanzas, both equal length, the first stanza reflects the 2nd stanza, the reflect, to the relfected.
- - - - as she reaches chidl hood, she revertably brought back and back again to her childhood, never ending loup, of the dark shadows of her dark meoemires.
  - - - the speaker ineherits a historical self hood.
  - - - stockholm syndrome: the physicplgocal condition of a hostage devloping on irrtional,r siky emotional attacthement to their captors.
  - - - in that case, by downing the speaker with revenge could be encapsulating plath remianging and rewiriting herself as a stronger woman in the man's abuse and abasnoment towards her.
- - - - imagery of a hard working / harsh conditions of a miner
- - - - darkness is almost hiding things from ourselves. - > it is in the unknown.
  - - - because of the ominous blackness desribed in the first stanza, it would seem plausible to suggest that the couple in the boat are being trasnsported to the world of the dead. as if they are travelling across a reiver such as Acheron or Styx.
      - the sound pattern of the monolyllabic lines creates a feeling of tension which is intensified by a question in line 2.
      - the water seems very threatening and the passengers of the boat are vulnerable as they are "cut paper people" overwhelmed by the huge shadows cast by the trees.
  - - - inexorably - unable to prevent.
  - - - are we looking at our fate, or reflection of our fate? - > stars after all will be reversed in the relfection, or are we guided by the stars, or our interreation there of? - > what is the stars say you were to be a fighter, or does it mean you will fight with words? - > one must fight.
        
        why plath descides to call this poem 'crossing the water'? - > a maethor for life in gerneral, a poet is giving us the most on the nose metpohor for what it means to be human, struggerling agianst the fate, interprteating our own fate, and doing so by struggerling agaisnt the water.