Poppies in July - Sylvia Plath
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Little poppies, little hell flames,
Do you do no harm?
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You flicker. I cannot touch you.
I put my hands among the flames. Nothing burns.
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And it exhausts me to watch you
Flickering like that, wrinkly and clear red, like the skin of a mouth
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A mouth just bloodied
Little bloody skirts!
There are fumes that I cannot touch.
Where are your opiates, your nauseous capsules?
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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.
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But colorless. Colorless.