Fever 103 by Sylvia Plath

This is an excerpt from the poem Fever 103 by Sylvia Plath

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I am too pure for you or anyone.

Your body

Hurts me as the world hurts God. I am a lantern——

My head a moon

Of Japanese paper, my gold beaten skin

Infinitely delicate and infinitely expensive.

Does not my heat astound you! And my light!

All by myself I am a huge camelliacamellia a plant native to Asia, with large flowers typically red or pink in color

Glowing and coming and going, flush on flush.

I think I am going up,

I think I may rise——

The beads of hot metal fly, and I love, I
Am a pure acetyleneacetylene a colorless, flammable gas that produces a high heat under pressure, used for torch welding and the cutting or purifying of metals

Virgin

Attended by roses,

By kisses, by cherubimcherubim plural of “cherub”; high-ranking angels mentioned in the Bible, often depicted in paintings as winged babies or toddlers.,

By whatever these pink things mean!

Not you, nor him

Nor him, nor him

(My selves dissolving, old whore petticoats)——

To Paradise.

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