Anne Sexton

For John, Who Begs Me Not To Enquire Further

Not that it was beautiful,

but that, in the end, there was

a certain sense of order there;

something worth learning

in that narrow diary of my mind,

in the commonplaces of the asylum

where the cracked mirror

or my own selfish death

outstared me.

And if I tried

to give you something else,

something outside of myself,

you would not know

that the worst of anyone

can be, finally,

an accident of hope.

I tapped my own head;

it was a glass, an inverted bowl.

It is a small thing

to rage in your own bowl.

At first it was private.

Then it was more than myself;

it was you, or your house

or your kitchen.

And if you turn away

because there is no lesson here

I will hold my awkward bowl,

with all its cracked stars shining

like a complicated lie,

and fasten a new skin around it

as if I were dressing an orange

or a strange sun.

Not that it was beautiful,

but that I found some order there.

There ought to be something special

for someone

in this kind of hope.

This is something I would never find

in a lovelier place, my dear,

although your fear is anyone's fear,

like an invisible veil between us all...

and sometimes in private,

my kitchen, your kitchen,

my face, your face.