Written on April 19, 196212, Elm is a longer poem when compared to Cut, also from the Ariel collection, containing 42 verses divided within 14 stanzas, 3 verses each, of varied length. The poems selected for this analysis are placed in sequence in the original 1965 edition and the 2004 restored edition, first Cut followed by Elm, but in the 1981 book Collected Poems the order is inverted because of editorial decision to place the poems chronologically, what sets them quite apart. The reader will once again immediately identify another dedication, this time to Ruth Fainlight. According to Steinberg (2004), Ruth Fainlight was a poet who Plath visited and read some of her fresh works, and Fainlight’s reaction to Elm pleased Plath so much that she dedicated the poem to her. Still related to Elm, the original title when first published was The Elm Speaks, “to facilitate understanding the speaker from its listener” (STEINGBERG, 2004, p. 101). Also, Elm is not a poem with many rhymes, but readers will find repetitions throughout the poem creating musicality, and setting the mood of the poem. Another interesting fact is the Elm tree is associated with death and the Underworld in Celtic mythology13, this is the reason why it is easily found in cemeteries across the UK.
For instance, selecting the Elm tree symbolically establishes a connection between the world of the living and the world of the dead, an act for recovering pagan cultural roots, very present in other poems of the collection, such as The Moon and the Yew Tree. In this very dark poem, a monologue is developed by the Elm tree addressed to a hidden individual spoken of right in
12 Poem dated in The Collected Poems (1981) edition.
13 https://treesforlife.org.uk/into-the-forest/trees-plants-animals/trees/elm/elm-mythology-and-folklore/
the open line, that claims to “know the bottom”, but still is in search of advice to resolve the most private fears, and the Elm tree is the source of knowledge, a reference for achieving that.
The way Elm speaks in the poem makes use of the figure of speech apostrophe, that according to Culler (1999), is speaking to someone or something which is not an actual listener of the poem, a device used to provoke or expose what is happening.
I know the bottom, she says. I know it with my great tap root:
It is what you fear.
I do not fear it: I have been there.
Is it the sea you hear in me, Its dissatisfactions?
Or the voice of nothing, that was your madness?
(PLATH, 1965, stanzas 1-2)
In the first stanza of Elm, the tree starts addressing to someone to show knowledge related to experience. The Elm tree taunts a previous statement of this hidden individual, who might be a woman because of the use of the pronoun “she”, that declares to “know the bottom”, what one could picture as a very dark, deep, and dreadful situation she has reached, like a pit bottom, the limit. Also, “the bottom” could be her mental illness, a declaration that she is aware of it and thinks to comprehend it entirely. Despite declaring so, the Elm does not agree, the first verse appears to be a mockery and it is the way the Elm validates its own experience and knowledge, far beyond when compared to the hidden persona. It already reached such “bottom” with its “great tap root”, which the main thick root gives the idea of digging far down in the earth, in other words, knowing mental illness aspects with the tap root, and the many facets of the effects of it in the mind of a person with its small ramifications. This stanza immediately sets the mood of the entire poem, the reader feels apprehension with the answer of the Elm, who affirms that “It is what you fear”, knowing the hidden figure fears her mental illness, but is significant to note this is also addressed to the reader. On the other hand, the Elm is fearless, because it already “have been there”, showing that it knows what is hiding at the bottom of the listener, the experience makes the Elm mighty before us.
Next, in stanza 2 the Elm questions the persona about what is the cause of her current state. The first question is if the persona can hear a sea sound coming from the Elm, and “its dissatisfactions”. The sound of a calm sea is peaceful and meditative sometimes, but in a
couple of hours can completely change to an aggressive state, just like moods in a person easily tends to switch. “Its dissatisfactions” can point out to the latter in which one understands that it is producing a deep sound, like in agitated tides, complaining inside it through /i/ sounds in this stanza. The other question involves the nothingness the hidden figure could heard, no sound to comfort her, or even nothing awakened her madness, it just snapped out of the blue. “Madness” is indicative of mental instability, probably the metaphors so far which involved “bottom” confirms the main topic is the most intimate side of the mind.
This poem is very auditory, the sounds produced or the idea of sounds lacking, and the double repetition of words (like “I”, “know”, “fear”) might disturb the persona and build up agony in the reader, so far in the poem, Plath makes use of such sounds to evoke mental illness, madness.
Love is a shadow.
How you lie and cry after it
Listen: these are its hooves: it has gone off, like a horse.
All night I shall gallop thus, impetuously, Till your head is a stone, your pillow a little turf, Echoing, echoing.
Or shall I bring you the sound of poisons?
This is rain now, this big hush.
And this is the fruit of it: tin-white, like arsenic.
(PLATH, 1965, stanzas 3-5)
In stanza 3, the emotional state of the persona is explored by the Elm. From the tree’s perspective, “Love is a shadow”, does not have a defined shape, is quite faint, and easy to lose, related to the images of the tree in the cemetery, darkness, and death, an antithesis that contrasts with the usual brighter images of love. The reader understands the love involved is not honest because of the statement that lies and cries right after it, establishing a sense of repetition. But it does not matter anyway, since this “love” is like a lost horse, “it has gone off” alone, provoking the feeling of loneliness, now unaided in the world. The element of loneliness has importance in the exploration of mental illness, as demonstrated by Donaldson (2002) who indicates two aspects of raving madness in her analysis of Jane Eyre: restraint and isolation. In the next stanza, the woman who listens metaphorically rides a horse, which plays a crucial role in this section of the poem. The act of riding the horse at night exposes the torturing thoughts because the night brings her agony, and suffering and accelerates to
worsening, possibly depriving sleep. Although there is no established limit, her mental illness triggers the desire to ride “till your head is a stone”, which could indicate the persona is trying to find a way to sleep carelessly, which could put her life on the line, maybe reaching suicidal thoughts. For example, one way to prove these torturing thoughts deprives sleeping is through the saying “your pillow a little turf”. This symbolizes peace, tranquility, and comfort, things the persona appears to seek the most at the moment, even if it means death, the eternal sleep.
Also, turf of grass is traditionally cultivated above graves in a cemetery, another connection to death. This stanza’s last verse locates another repetition of the poem, “Echoing, echoing”, what could be the recurrent torturing thoughts haunting the woman every night, something had happened, still echoes from the past and links to the present states of things.
In stanza 5, the idea of the committing suicide is even more clear to the reader due to two factors. First, the Elm tree itself gives the option of the “sound of poisons” as a solution, a metaphor for committing suicide in silence, in a discrete way. Silence means loneliness, accompanied by rain, a metaphor for the persona’s tears that suddenly emerge, brought by sadness while longing for the possibility of dying, alone. One of the main characteristics of confessional poetry involves exploring personal fears, sufferings, and anxieties, elements found well reflected in Elm’s stanza 5. Indeed, the situation presented is very intimate, suffering is contained inside till that is not possible anymore, culminating in thinking about suicide to cease the emotional pain from mental breakdown, although fears in doing so unaided. The second “this” in the last verse of stanza 5 refers to sadness that provides its product by a simile, a “tin-white, like arsenic” fruit. Here Elm is chaotic and ambiguous, it is possible to interpret the whiteness of the fruit or poison as a new start, looking for a new fruit, a new love. But this option is compared by simile to one mortal element, Arsenic14, a well-known poisonous element, usually found in a crystalline gray metallic form, very common in insecticides and weed killers. So, what the Elm proposes is the termination of her life, committing suicide by arsenic, as inducing the listener to seek this solution to put an end to her condition. The other detail reinforcing the idea of possibly committing suicide to finally ease those torturing thoughts is related to the tree. The Elm tree leaves and sap are toxic15 if ingested or touched in a certain amount by humans or other animals.
14 https://www.thefreedictionary.com/arsenic
15 https://ucanr.edu/sites/poisonous_safe_plants/Toxic_Plants_by_Scientific_Name_685/
I have suffered the atrocity of sunsets.
Scorched to the root
My red filaments burn and stand, a hand of wires.
Now I break up in pieces that fly about like clubs.
A wind of such violence
Will tolerate no bystanding: I must shriek.
(PLATH, 1965, stanzas 6-7)
Now the Elm exposes its own torments and anguishes to the listener and readers. In an article that both contrast and compare Sylvia Plath’s ‘Elm’ and Munch’s ‘The Scream’, Hakeem (1974, p.534) states that stanza 6 is where “the inexpressible dread that leads to the traumatic breakdown and thrust itself in that frantic shriek is superbly described in such lines”. The Elm denounces “suffered the atrocity of sunsets”, which might indicate that its condition worsens throughout the day, similar to the persona’s, to the point that hurts her when the sun sets when night comes. Sunset might be a symbol of an ending, maybe a relationship ending, the situation of being abandoned is traumatic. Next, the Elm tree declares that is “scorched to the roots”, a metaphor for being deeply hurt, tortured to the core by fire. In this case, “root” could be another metaphor for her mind or head, hinted by the following verse that mentions “My red filaments”, its small root ramifications are burned, but still stands. “A hand of wires” is a very interesting piece of information, since human nerve cells in the brain, more specifically its synapses which transmit orders, look like arms and hands connecting the whole body. In addition to that, “wires” is another indication of a web connecting the whole body to a core, to its mind. So, is possible to assume that the Elm tree is talking about a mental trauma caused by an external source, what also provoked its mental illness, like a traumatic end, something or someone left it to its luck.
Based on what was presented so far, the reader understands the Elm tree has a mental breakdown too. Stanza 7 is the culmination of its feelings, so broken to pieces that can easily be taken by the wind, the tree cannot react or snap out of it because it is restrained. Possibly, this wind is similar to a hurricane with strong gusts of wind in which one cannot simply stand hoping that nothing will happen or it is a metaphor for taking it apart in pieces. Interestingly, natural element actions such as rain, fire, and wind, usually considered as part of the life cycle of a tree just make it suffer more, like the setting around just make it even sicker by natural abrasion. Thus, in the powerful verse “I must shriek”, the Elm screams, but not to the outside, actually to the inside of it, still containing the feeling of desperation, or according to Doche
(2021, p. 327), “semantically suffers from a process of disintegration”, but cannot do anything because it is restrained and isolated.
The moon, also, is merciless: she would drag me Cruelly, being barren.
Her radiance scathes me. Or perhaps I have caught her.
I let her go. I let her go
Diminished and flat, as after radical surgery.
How your bad dreams possess and endow me.
(PLATH, 1965, stanzas 8-9)
In stanza 8 the Elm opens up even more and now accuses the moon to be the cruel torturer. The moon is a representation of the night, presented earlier as the period in which both the persona and the Elm tree suffer the most, now categorized as “merciless”, metaphorically saying “she” would perform acts of torture against the tree. In many Ariel poems, the moon is represented as a woman, a mother, a companion, someone who watches the voice of the poems, which is a shock when compared to Elm which turns out as an evil figure that would even drag someone away, to keep it isolated just for herself. Also, attached to the Moon comes the night and the Elm’s mental illness, a situation that connects these two elements to establish a relation, similar to Bertha Mason’s condition moments in Jane Eyre, which worsens at night. Besides, the fact of “being barren” would be enough reason for pity or mercy towards the Elm tree, in this poem the cruel Moon does not sympathize with the idea of being merciful though. Despite all that, she still envies the moon, even though “her radiance” is so great that it causes injuries, painfully, again the sensation of the embodiment is important for the confessional style, showing that its mental condition is horrible, far greater than the persona’s. The final piece of the verse might indicate that somehow, the tree
“caught”, captured the moon, but almost immediately let it go in the following verse, again using a repetition, like regretting doing that. The moon is not the same anymore, now
“diminished and flat”. Did the tree capture the moon to commit acts of torture too?
Interestingly, the Elm tree completes comparing the moon state with a person that had a
“radical surgery”, not the same as before. The body is much explored by Garland-Thomson (2002) who alerts from the Feminist Disability Theory that surgeries can avoid disease, sorrow, and wound, this is a social objective, but the attempt of eliminating the wide range of body forms is a eugenic undertaking, what the Elm tree had done to the Moon, this radical
surgery, is a kind of torture or elimination attempt. Finally, the Elm undertaking might have consequences, now tormented by the moon’s “bad dreams”, probably the start of its mental breakdown, as an inheritance, both “possess” in a spiritual way, and “endow”, gifted with those bad dreams.
I am inhabited by a cry.
Nightly it flaps out
Looking, with its hooks, for something to love.
I am terrified by this dark thing That sleeps in me;
All day I feel its soft, feathery turnings, its malignity.
(PLATH, 1965, stanzas 10-11)
In stanzas 10 and 11 the Elm exposes fears and anguishes, exploring what it feels. The initial verse is a scream, but not towards the outside, it is contained inside the persona, to the Elm tree alone. The feeling of desperation is immense and cannot be contained, augmented by the repetition of /ai/ sounds in that single verse. At night, the “cry” search “for something to love”, but violently with “hooks”, like fishing in the open sea something that could lighten the tree’s feelings. From the confessional style perspective, this desperate “cry” happens for a reason, a sleeping “dark thing”, a metaphor that represents mental illness, like depression.
This “dark thing” is alive, reminding continuously its presence with inviting “soft, feathery turnings”, but the tree knows how it is full of malice, hostility, and evil. The repetition of /i/
sounds has an important role in adding tension as the reader advances in the poem, forming a dread mental image.
Clouds pass and disperse.
Are those the faces of love, those pale irretrievables?
Is it for such I agitate my heart?
(PLATH, 1965, stanza 12)
In stanza 12, time passes, and the tree misses lost loved ones. “Clouds pass and disperse” is an indication of time passing, as clouds are formed and unformed by natural elements, which takes time. The Elm grieves loving ones, missing those “faces of love”, which one could consider already dead. The tree seems agitated, not certain if what drove it to a mental breakdown could be the loss of “those pale irretrievables” that will never come back, leaving it alone without a north to follow onward. Also, this reinforces a deadly aura around
the poem together with other elements such as insisting desire for committing suicide by poisoning.
I am incapable of more knowledge.
What is this, this face
So murderous in its strangle of branches?——
Its snaky acids hiss.
It petrifies the will. These are the isolate, slow faults That kill, that kill, that kill.
(PLATH, 1965, stanzas 13-14)
In the final two stanzas, the Elm visualizes and comprehends what is tormenting the person listening. The Elm states that has no room for more knowledge, a recognition that it understands fully and knows what is slowly torturing the persona’s mind. This occurs so well the Elm can see inside her wits, between “strangle of branches”, a metaphor for the numerous synapses, part of the nerve cells, a murderous face that inhabits will. Hakeem (1974) notes there is also the notion of a suffocating atmosphere in this section of the poem. The shape of the thing is not defined, and the darkness of the shadow is again brought up, but the sounds coming from the words chosen to depict this “dark thing” draw a monster in the reader’s mind, using Pound’s melopoeia. The /s/ sounds in this stanza, as seen in “snaky”, “acids”,
“hiss”, “petrifies”, “isolate”, “slow”, and “faults” creates a similar hissing of a snake ready to attack or that reminds to keep quiet to not awake a sleeping monster. A terrifying sound that dominates the hearer with fear, “petrifies the will” to move away, justifying why the persona cannot react against it. The Elm understands it as a result of “isolate, slow faults”, carried by the persona in regret (maybe towards those “pale irretrievables”?), slowly consuming thoughts and worsening the situation towards a mental breakdown. Also, the existence of a sense of continuity, part of a never-ending cycle in the poem, symbolizes the recurrent repetition of errors, demonstrated in repeating three times “that kill” in the final verse, the only time there is a triple repetition in the poem.