Mirror Sylvia Plath

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I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
Whatever I see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.
I am not cruel, only truthful—
The eye of a little god, four-cornered.
Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.
It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long
I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.
Faces and darkness separate us over and over.
Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,
Searching my reaches for what she really is.
Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.
I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.
She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.
I am important to her. She comes and goes.
Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.
In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman
Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.

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Overnight, very
Whitely, discreetly,
Very quietly

Our toes, our noses
Take hold on the loam,
Acquire the air.

Nobody sees us,
Stops us, betrays us;
The small grains make room.

Soft fists insist on
Heaving the needles,
The leafy bedding,

Even the paving.
Our hammers, our rams,
Earless and eyeless,

Perfectly voiceless,
Widen the crannies,
Shoulder through holes. We

Diet on water,
On crumbs of shadow,
Bland-mannered, asking

Little or nothing.
So many of us!
So many of us!

We are shelves, we are
Tables, we are meek,
We are edible,

Nudgers and shovers
In spite of ourselves.
Our kind multiplies:

We shall by morning
Inherit the earth.
Our foot’s in the door.

Mirror
1. What thoughts or feelings did “Mirror” evoke in you? Did you find the poem surprising? Explain. (Review your Quickwrite.)
2. Identify the speaker of the poem. In what ways does Plath personify the speaker?
3. Describe the qualities that the speaker claims to possess. What does the speaker imply by saying “the eye of a little god” (line 5)?
4. The last line of “Mirror” contains the striking image of “a terrible fish.” How would you explain the significance of this image in the poem? What associations and emotional overtones does the image have for you?

Mushrooms
1. What do you think this poem is really about?
2. Who is speaking in the poem?
3. What natural process do the speakers describe? What figures of speech help you to picture parts of that process?
4. “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth” is a well known expression from the New Testament of the Bible. What ironic twist is given to this scripture at the end of the poem?
5. What tone do you hear in the poem? What specific words help create that tone?
6. Both “Mirror” and “Mushrooms” deal with realities that lurk beneath the surface of appearances. What would you say those realities are?
7. What kind of people are like the mushrooms? Is the story told in the poem a sinister one or a comical one—or is it something else? How have life experiences affected your interpretations?