"I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;
I lift my lids and all is born again.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)”
-Sylvia Plath

He stood in the middle of the open field,
his mud-ridden boots,
ripped jeans,
and half-buttoned flannel shirt
suiting him for the feat
he was about to accomplish.

The rainfall the day before made
the ground a clean canvas
for him to fill with today’s burden.
He picked up the shovel and smoothed
out the hardening mud.

From his overused messenger bag,
he pulled out a sharpened stick
and a pair of headphones.
The music turned on,
his face lit up and he began
to carve letters, then words,
and eventually sentences into the mud,
every stroke filled
with overwhelming passion.
Expressing his silent love affair
with Sylvia Plath,
he rewrote every word of
“Mad Girl's Love Song.”

Once the masterpiece was complete,
he stood from his knees
and wiped his hands on his jeans.
Letting out a deep breath,
grabbing his bag,
he pulled out a rose
and laid it beneath
the last line in his work–
" Rest in Peace, Sylvia."
It had been fifty years
from the day
she had committed suicide.