Apologies for lack of all things Sylvia Plath...

Apologies for my lack of updates, life got in the way, not bad, just busy. There will be more updates soon on things and puchases regarding Sylvia Plath (and Ted Hughes). In the meantime here is a slightly Plath related post, a 'Poem for a Birthday' so to speak for a dear friend who is an archivist, historian and superb Plathophile indeed. Cheers to you Mr Steinberg at the fabulous  www.sylviaplathinfo.blogspot.com

The Archivist

 

He dwells amongst

Papers, documents,

Letters and manuscripts.

Paper becomes breath.

It is a silent space,

A world of the past

That with gentle care

Remains vitally present.

He is captivated by history,

Propelled by a desire

To preserve and

The need to catalogue

And collate the

Haunting ephemera

Of other lives

That echo and call.

They insistently whisper

Across decades

That there is more to

Their stories if you look.

Authorless  words —

But not dead matter.

This is not a tomb

Where words rest

Silent and still

As spectral voices

Ask him to please

Return to them.

Return again and again.

That by sharing them

And keeping them

From the dust,

By searching amongst

Words and images —

Something more than

What once was endures.

This is the quiet world

Of the archivist

Carefully tending to

These ghostly archives.