Talk to me about sadness. I talk about it too much in my own head but I never mind others talking about it either; I occasionally feel like I tremendously need others to talk about it as well.
Interpretation
This quote reflects the importance of discussing emotions like sadness, both in personal reflection and shared dialogue.
Anne Sexton emphasizes the need for open discussions about sadness, suggesting that while it is often a solitary struggle, sharing it with others can provide a sense of relief and connection. She acknowledges her own tendency to dwell on sadness but also expresses a desire for others to engage in these conversations, highlighting the communal aspect of emotional experiences.
In practice
In a therapy session to highlight the importance of discussing feelings.
The Witch's Life" When I was a child there was an old woman in our neighborhood whom we called The Witch. All day she peered from her second story window from behind the wrinkled curtains and sometimes she would open the window and yell: Get out of my life! She had hair like kelp and a voice like a boulder. I think of her sometimes now and wonder if I am becoming her.
Do you like me?” No answer. Silence bounced, fell off his tongue and sat between us and clogged my throat. It slaughtered my trust. It tore cigarettes out of my mouth. We exchanged blind words, and I did not cry, I did not beg, but blackness filled my ears, blackness lunged in my heart, and something that had been good, a sort of kindly oxygen, turned into a gas oven.
Don't bite till you know if it's bread or stone.
Abundance is scooped from abundance yet abundance remains.
I find now, swallowing one teaspoon of pain, that it drops downward to the past where it mixes with last year’s cupful and downward into a decade’s quart and downward into a lifetime’s ocean. I alternate treading water and deadman’s float.
I am your dwarf. I am the enemy within. I am the boss of your dreams. See. Your hand shakes. It is not palsy or booze. It is your Doppelganger trying to get out. Beware...Beware...
Imagine me; I shall not exist if you do not imagine me; try to discern the doe in me, trembling in the forest of my own iniquity; let's even smile a little. After all, there is no harm in smiling.
Madness is rare in individuals - but in groups, parties, nations, and ages it is the rule.
Humanity? Humanity is not concerned with us. Today anything is allowed. Anything is possible.
There is no easy way to create a world where men and women can live together... But if such a world is created in our lifetime, it will be done by rejecting the racism, materialism, and violence that has characterized Western civilization and especially by working toward a world of brotherhood, cooperation, and peace.
I live my life in widening circles that reach out across the world.
There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.
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