Crossing the Water

Crossing the Water is a 1971 posthumous collection of poetry by Sylvia Plath that was prepared for publication by Ted Hughes. These are transitional poems that were written along with the poems that appear in her poetic opus, Ariel. The collection was published in the United Kingdom by Faber & Faber (1975) and in the United States by Harper & Row (1976).

The poems here, mostly written between 1960 and 1961, tend to dwell on one's state of being in an environment. "Wuthering Heights," for example, details a walk that Plath takes along the Yorkshire moors where Emily Brontë once trekked, Finisterre is a stormy island where Plath and her family once visited and "Among the Narcissi" describes Plath's similarities with being among asexual vegetation.

Contents

 * 1) Wuthering Heights
 * 2) Pheasant
 * 3) Crossing the Water
 * 4) Finisterre
 * 5) Face Lift
 * 6) Parliament Hill Fields
 * 7) Insomniac
 * 8) An Appearance
 * 9) Blackberrying
 * 10) I Am Vertical
 * 11) The Babysitters
 * 12) In Plaster
 * 13) Leaving Early
 * 14) Stillborn
 * 15) Private Ground
 * 16) Heavy Woman
 * 17) Widow
 * 18) Magi
 * 19) Candles
 * 20) Event
 * 21) Love Letter
 * 22) Small Hours
 * 23) Sleep in the Mojave Desert
 * 24) The Surgeon at 2 a.m.
 * 25) Two Campers In Cloud Country
 * 26) Mirror
 * 27) A Life
 * 28) On Deck
 * 29) Apprehensions
 * 30) Zoo Keeper's Wife
 * 31) Whitsun
 * 32) The Tour
 * 33) Last Words
 * 34) Among the Narcissi