Anne Sexton poem help?

Question

Can you help me annotate this poem? It is called "Pain for My Daughter". Any info is fine (theme, connotation&denotation, hidden meanings, etc). I truly appreciate it (:
here is the poem if you need it:
http://www.bagatellen.com/cgi-bin/mt-comments.cgi?entry_id=1224
scroll down about halfway
thanks!

Answer 1

Running commentary:

PAIN FOR A DAUGHTER

Blind with love, my daughter
has cried nightly for horses,
those long-necked marchers and churners
that she has mastered, any and all,
reigning them in like a circus hand --
the excitable muscles and the ripe neck;
tending this summer, a pony and a foal.
....... the daughter loves horses, dreams about them, yearns
for and admires their riders. She yearns to touch their necks whether a pony or a foal.

She who is too squeamish to pull
a thorn from the dog’s paw,
watched her pony blossom with distemper,
the underside of the jaw swelling
like an enormous grape.
. . . . although she can never pull a thorn from a dog's paw,
she watched a pony becoming aggressive in pain due to a prick on the jaw, and the wound was swelling.

Gritting her teeth with love,
she drained the boil and scoured it
with hydrogen peroxide until pus
ran like milk on the barn floor
. . . . . Because she loves horses, she was very affected, looked for hydrogen peroxide and approached the animal to help apply medicine to the wound which oozed milk-like pus all over the barn floor.

Blind with loss all winter,
in dungarees, a ski jacket and a hard hat,
she visits the neighbors’ stable,
our acreage not zoned for barns;
. .. . . . . Affected and pitying the horse, she visited the neighbor's stable in the midst of winter with only a ski jacket and hat on.

they who own the flaming horses
and the swan-whipped thoroughbred
that she tugs at and cajoles,
thinking it will burn like a furnace
under her small-hipped English seat.
. . . . the neighbors have special well-bred horses. she went to test the medicine on those horses afraid that it may burn a horse like furnace.

Blind with pain she limps home
the thoroughbred has stood on her foot.
He rested there like a building.
. . . . she soon returned limping since a big horse had stepped on her foot.

He grew into her foot until they were one.
The marks of the horseshoe printed
into her flesh, the tips of her toes
ripped off like pieces of leather,
three toenails swirled like shells
and left to float in blood in her riding boot.
. . . . ... the marks of horshoe were clearly imprinted on her wounded foot with open flesh since the stallion's weight had ripped off her boots and her three toe-nails looked as if floating in blood.

Blind with fear, she sits on the toilet,
her foot balanced over the washbasin,
her father, hydrogen peroxide in hand,
performing the rites of the cleansing.
. . . . . she went inside the toilet and tried to cool her foot balancing it over the washbasin. Her father rushed in with the same medicine, hydrogen peroxide and applied it to the girl.

She bites on a towel, sucked in breath,
sucked in and arched against the pain,
her eyes glancing off me where
I stand at the door, eyes locked
on the ceiling, eyes of a stranger,
and then she cries...
. . . . . she had to remain still biting on a peroxide coated towel to relieve her pain. Her eyes moved all round then focussed on the ceiling strangely. And she began to cry.

Oh my God, help me!
Where a child would have cried Mama!
Where a child would have believed Mama!
. . . . . Oh my god help me! yet a child ought to have cried for mother not god to help.

she bit the towel and called on God
and I saw her life stretch out...
. . . . she bit on the towel still pleading with god and I saw her body stretching out

I saw her torn in childbirth,
and I saw her, at that moment,
in her own death and I knew that she
knew
. . . .And I saw at that moment, the pains of chilbirth. And I saw her lose her die and at that moment of her death, I became aware (perhaps of the absurdity of life).

*

-The theme: Death of a daughter; new awareness gained by mother; when love and desire to help leads to calamity;
Symbolic:The girl who wanted to help a horse ends taking the horse's place. The peroxide is applied to herself when she is wounded.

Try to figure out the many layers of meanings that are present.
I returned to help since, no other person came up with another response.

good luck

Answer 2

Margot, continually savour your posts. This one would desire to apply some minor tweaking, enhancing, yet often typo's and grammar stuff...some line injury oddities, yet very Sextonesque. The remark approximately being conscious of Louie's...nicely, you recognize, threw me somewhat because of the fact it regarded out of context/character...until eventually you be effective to "whom" this poem became committed. Mature for effective. i've got written some poems on former-residing poets, yet I won't difficulty you with posting my stuff on your question. i've got written no longer something particularly like "this" one...even however consistent with possibility I could attempt. Edit your poem for the minor equipment defects (maximum could be caught in spell-verify) and get it published on some thing on the topic of Sexton...i'm no longer able to think of all people actual to her poetry objecting or no longer desirous to comprise your poem. correct achieved

Answer 3

Who would want to improve upon perfection, give ari the points.

dd