“Lady Lazarus”, a poem by Sylvia Plath, depicts a woman’s experience with suicide. This haunting piece of writing can be interpreted to be an illustration of Plath’s own attempts to take her life and her fascination with the concept of it. The references to the biblical figure Lazarus, who was raised from the dead, as well as the imagery of the Holocaust, leaves the reader to consider the complex layers of this powerful piece of poetry. Check out the full poem here.

Nevertheless, I am the same, identical woman.
The first time it happened I was ten.
It was an accident.

The second time I meant
To last it out and not come back at all.
I rocked shut

As a seashell.
They had to call and call
And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls.

Dying
Is an art, like everything else.
I do it exceptionally well.

Image Credit:
Feature: Eva Blue at Unsplash, Creative Commons