All My Pretty Ones

"All my pretty ones?
Did you say all?  O hell-kite! All?
What! all my pretty chickens and their dam
at one fell swoop?...
I cannot but remember such things were,
that were most precious to me."
-Macbeth

Anne Sexton was a confessional poet.  The facts of Sexton's troubled and chaotic life are well known; no other American poet in our time has cried aloud publicly over so many details.  Although the frankness of Sexton's poetry attracted many female readers, male critics/fellow poets took offense.  Sexton's work rapidly became a focal point in the feminist movement.  How far can a woman go to express herself?  Women poets owe a debt to Anne Sexton.  Because Sexton was willing to break new ground, shatter taboos, and endure a barrage of professional and personal attacks.  The flamboyance of her subject matter (abortion, incest, adultery, drug and alcohol addiction, the fears being and inadequate wife and mother) paved the way for future women who wished to write without hindrance.  Anne Sexton assembled a rock group to perform her poetry with.  Click here to download a sound file of Sexton reading her poem "All My Pretty Ones."  You will need an MP3 player like Winamp to hear the file.  In 1974, Anne Sexton committed suicide from carbon monoxide poisoning.  Her life and poetry were, and continue to be, an inspiration to women around the world.