Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

In "The Moon and the Yew Tree," Sylvia Plath offers a haunting meditation on despair, faith, and the quest for meaning. The poem journeys through vivid landscapes and celestial metaphors to grapple with deeply rooted emotional and existential crises. Plath uses nature-the moon, the yew tree, the grasses-as not just physical entities but as emotional and philosophical indicators, giving them agency and voice to reflect human conditions.

The poem starts with an attempt to understand the mind's light, "cold and planetary," which seems disconnected from a nurturing or caring world. The "trees of the mind are black," Plath notes, establishing an environment that is not verdant and full of life but desolate. This emotional landscape is separated "from my house by a row of headstones," a poignant image that suggests death or, at least, a severe disconnect between the self and a sense of home or belonging.

"The moon is no door," the poet states, clarifying that no easy exits exist from this mental or emotional state. The moon itself is not a portal to another world but "a face in its own right," with its emotions ("terribly upset") and its dark influences ("it drags the sea after it like a dark crime"). Plath brings the celestial body down to Earth, assigning it human attributes and making it part of the emotional landscape she's navigating.

The mention of church bells "affirming the Resurrection" might imply a societal expectation of faith as a route out of despair, but even this spiritual awakening is overshadowed by the yew tree's "Gothic shape" and the moon's overwhelming presence. The moon, described as "my mother," is not a figure of comforting tenderness. Instead, she "unlooses small bats and owls," indicating an unsettling, even menacing, maternal influence.

The lament "How I would like to believe in tenderness" speaks to the universal yearning for comfort and kindness, but even in this desire, Plath is met with "the face of the effigy, gentled by candles," a mere representation of tenderness, not the actual experience of it. She admits to having "fallen a long way," echoing both literal and metaphorical descents-whether from faith, from grace, or from emotional stability.

"Clouds are flowering / Blue and mystical over the face of the stars" signifies the encroachment of earthly concerns over cosmic permanence, a theme reinforced by the internal realm of the church where "saints will be all blue, / Floating on their delicate feet over cold pews." However, these figures, hallowed though they may be, are "stiff with holiness," inaccessible, and distant from human sorrow.

In the final lines, the moon and the yew tree, these persistent symbols throughout the poem, distill their messages into "blackness and silence." In a world where holiness is stiff and mother figures unleash nocturnal creatures, where both natural and celestial phenomena offer no solace, Plath concludes that blackness and silence are the ultimate, unchangeable conditions of existence. This assertion might appear defeatist, but it is more of a stark confrontation with life's complexities and disappointments, characteristic of Plath's work. She paints an emotional panorama where luminosity and darkness, faith and despair are intertwined, each providing context for the other in a never-ending dance.

Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!

Other Poems of Interest...