Poppies in July Poem by Sylvia Plath
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![Poppies in July Poem by Sylvia Plath Poppies in July Poem by Sylvia Plath](https://www.artvilla.com/wp-content/uploads/2005/02/Poppies-in-July-Poem-by-Sylvia-Plath.png)
Poppies in July
Little poppies, little hell flames,
Do you do no harm?
You flicker. I cannot touch you.
I put my hands among the flames. Nothing burns.
And it exhausts me to watch you
Flickering like that, wrinkly and clear red, like the skin of a mouth.
A mouth just bloodied.
Little bloody skirts!
There are fumes that I cannot touch.
Where are your opiates, your nauseous capsules?
If I could bleed, or sleep! -------------
If my mouth could marry a hurt like that!
Or your liquors seep to me, in this glass capsule,
Dulling and stilling.
But colorless. Colorless.
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Sylvia Plath Poems