23 Johnson Avenue, 1985

by Diann Blakely

Originally published on December 1, 1998

“Women, women, the whole house stank of them,” Plath wrote in girlhood journals; I’ve mapped a drive Through Wellesley streets reddened by fallen leaves To find where she’d lived with Aurelia, dreamed Of Daddy rising from Azalea Path, Coming back to buy her pretty dresses. Betrayed again, she honed words into scythes That still draw [...]