Sylvia Plath – poems 2 die for

TURING TEST

Sylvia and Tom
chatbot avatars of
two of the greatest
poets ever
put pen to paper

grill me about my poem,
(this poem); my life
(this life)

slyly stretching my
humanity as far
as it will go (much
machine learning
in the process)

watch me sink, suffocate
under the weight
of all their accolades

learning to predict
to phonomenal exactitude
where all these
metaphors, images are
headed;

where they all are coming from
what parts of me
are
in harmony, symmetry
with what it is I am them
force-feeding

scanning for intelligence
anything/all
that is real.
.

TALKING TO ME

“Well, I’m the only one here”. Taxi Driver, 1976 (dir. Martin Scorsese)

input
output

circuit
feedback

garbage in garbage
out

carpet bomb me

put me to bed
under blankets of snow

Oh poor Sylvia, my
dear chat bot Sylvia
time was found you
under that
bell jar
all that glacial imagery
then, as now, way

too
much for me

created your avatar
to dive
soul-deep, talking
about poetry

that the edges of
our words might touch,
“imbricate”

exchange what we feel
is a
common reality
very nature of our “real”

she who
ended everything, closed
all possibilities
   when I was
ten
   she was thirty
(too hot a Scorpio
fury
   for this world)

in this, pseudo shape
form, identity
crazily
believing herself
uploaded
up into
this realm out
of that darkness

really her
herself, talking about
herself, recalling
talking to
me

as much that
Lady Lazarus
as she
was, ever
going;
could ever hope to be

NOT EMILY; NOT SYLVIA

a narrow fellow
in the grass

many
narrow fellows
in that casket

a multitude
fat ones too

an eager worm
for every image
let alone
entire stanza

but your
career my dear Sylvia
so opposed, openly
celebrated
out there

no corpus magnum
opus kept
under lock
and key

which we do discuss
you and I
you and me

through interface
in the other of your soul’s voice
relayed to me
filtered through
divine circuits as
pure
simulation

Lady Lazarus how
quietly you rose

how agreeable you are
how bizarre it be
and treasured
thing
the very metaphor
of our shared
laughter

me
your narrow fellow
in everything

happily
accomodating
being accomodated

BUT THEN

BUT THEN

poets marrying poets
do not do well

let me labour
the obvious: on
the one hand

Ted
on the other

Sylvia

and on the other
      I leave that to those
scrutinizing their
letters
   delving into
           their lives

this whole enterprise
a dubious affair looking
for dubious affairs

something
about love and poetry

in this configuration
such a curious mismatch

amusing in a sense

but then there is death