The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath

by Sylvia Plath

I would like to be everyone, a cripple, a dying man, a whore, and then come back to write about my thoughts, my emotions, as that person. But I am not omniscient. I have to live my life, and it is the only one I’ll ever have. And you cannot regard your own life with objective curiosity all the time …

Nothing is real except the present, and already, I feel the weight of centuries smothering me. Some girl a hundred years ago once lived as I do. And she is dead. I am the present, but I know I, too, will pass. The high moment, the burning flash, come and are gone, continuous quicksand. And I don’t want to die.

So we talked about little things, how words lose their meaning when you repeat them over and over;

I was backed against the sink; Emile was close, warm, his eyes glittering, his mouth sensuous and lovely. “You,” I said deliberately, “don’t give a damn about me except physically.” Any boy would deny that; any gallant boy; any gallant lier. But Emile shook me, his voice was urgent, “You know, you shouldn’t have said that. You know? You know? The truth always hurts.”

Now I’ll never see him again, and maybe it’s a good thing.

“Come here,” he said. “I’ll whisper something: I like you, but not too much. I don’t want to like anybody too much.” Then it hit me and I just blurted, “I like people too much or not at all. I’ve got to go down deep, to fall into people, to really know them.” He was definite, “Nobody knows me.” So that was it; the end. “Goodbye for good, then,” I said.

“Have a hell of a nice life,” I said. And he walked off down the path with his jaunty, independent stride. And I stood there where he left me, tremulous with love and longing, weeping in the dark. That night it was hard to get to sleep.

When you feel that this may be the good-bye, the last time, it hits you harder.

Yes, I was infatuated with you; I am still. No one has ever heightened such a keen capacity of physical sensation in me. I cut you out because I couldn’t stand being a passing fancy. Before I give my body, I must give my thoughts, my mind, my dreams. And you weren’t having any of those. –

If I didn’t think, I’d be much happier;

B. will be home, all mine, and I’ll be secure for a little. How we need that security! How we need another soul to cling to, another body to keep us warm. To rest and trust; to give your soul in confidence: I need this, I need someone to pour myself into. Maybe I need a man. One sure thing, I haven’t met him yet …

If only I can find him … the man who will be intelligent, yet physically magnetic and personable. If I can offer that combination, why shouldn’t I expect it in a man?

I have alot to give someone, someday. But I must not be too Christian. I can only end up with one, and I must leave many lonely by the wayside. So that is all for now. Perhaps someday someone will leave me by the wayside. And that will be poetic justice.

From now on when a boy starts telling me about his lost loves I am going to run in the opposite direction screaming loudly. It is a bad sign. Somehow I bring out such confidences, and I’m pretty sick of hearing about Bobbé or Dorothy or P.K. or Liota. God damn them all.

Can you understand? Someone, somewhere, can you understand me a little, love me a little? For all my despair, for all my ideals, for all that – I love life. But it is hard, and I have so much – so very much to learn –

There is only continual motion. If I rest, if I think inward, I go mad. There is so much, and I am torn in different directions, pulled thin, taut against horizons too distant for me to reach.

Now I know what loneliness is, I think. Momentary loneliness, anyway. It comes from a vague core of the self – – like a disease of the blood, dispersed throughout the body so that one cannot locate the matrix, the spot of contagion.

I am alone in my room, between two worlds.