Hilda Faeza Arifin (160110101083)
Analysis poem “Blackberrying” by Sylvia Plath using discursive method
Blackberrying
by Sylvia Plath
Nobody in the lane, and nothing, nothing but blackberries,
Blackberries on either side, though on the right mainly,
A blackberry alley, going down in hooks, and a sea
Somewhere at the end of it, heaving. Blackberries
Big as the ball of my thumb, and dumb as eyes
Ebon in the hedges, fat
With blue-red juices. These they squander on my fingers.
I had not asked for such a blood sisterhood; they must love me.
They accommodate themselves to my milkbottle, flattening their sides.
Overhead go the choughs in black, cacophonous flocks—
Bits of burnt paper wheeling in a blown sky.
Theirs is the only voice, protesting, protesting.
I do not think the sea will appear at all.
The high, green meadows are glowing, as if lit from within.
I come to one bush of berries so ripe it is a bush of flies,
Hanging their bluegreen bellies and their wing panes in a Chinese screen.
The honey-feast of the berries has stunned them; they believe in heaven.
One more hook, and the berries and bushes end.
The only thing to come now is the sea.
From between two hills a sudden wind funnels at me,
Slapping its phantom laundry in my face.
These hills are too green and sweet to have tasted salt.
I follow the sheep path between them. A last hook brings me
To the hills’ northern face, and the face is orange rock
That looks out on nothing, nothing but a great space
Of white and pewter lights, and a din like silversmiths
Beating and beating at an intractable metal.
Analysis
Blackberrying is a poem written by Plath to show satisfaction in being the mother of her life.
The atmosphere of poetry in the first two verses is happiness and joy. Towards the end of
verse two and all three verses there are mood swings and poetry becomes rather sad or tense.
The word ablackberry was used several times in the opening of poetry. It aims to emphasize
the importance of the object in the poem, which might be a symbol of how Plath's children
are an important part of her life. The parable used creates the feeling that the absence and
cessation of the path in poetry means death in her life. In the first verse of poetry, Plath takes
the reader to the scene when picking blackberries in the forest near the sea. Through the use
