Sylvia Plath

"The Arrival of the Bee Box"

One of the two ways in which the work may be interpreted is as a reflection on the poet’s feelings as a mother.  The idea of a beekeeper is directly representative of Plath as a mother and her trepidations concerning motherhood.  Chiefly, a beekeeper is a caregiver, one who sees after the needs of those in their care.  The work is fraught with illusions of the fear that a mother might have for her child and the concerns, both rational and irrational, that, at times, point to mental instability.

The line, “The box is locked, it is dangerous” exemplifies the fear that a mother might have that is “locked” within here.  Here a the question of the speaker’s mental stability is questioned.  Certainly, the healthy mother would not bottle up fear but, rather, confront it, as nature would demand.  The inclusion of the concept of danger proves that the locking away of this fear will result in negative repercussions.  The beginnings of questioning one’s ability to care, in any sense of the word, for a mother foreshadows what would likely, today, be considered post-partum depression.

This concept is illustrated later in the poem in line, “They can die, I need feed them nothing.”  The basic function of a mother is to provide this care and when it is called into question, so is the mental well being of the mother.  This concept is well before its time at the time that this was written.  A mother killing her child from refusal to feed the child illustrates this concept perfectly.  It is both literal and figurative in a mother providing nourishment to a child through her breast milk and the traditional classical interpretation thereof, that of the purest form of care giving.

The lines, “I wonder how hungry they are. / I wonder if they would forget me”  both speak to the natural feelings of a mother and to the irrational feelings of this mother.  Simply wondering is not sufficient to provide care, action must be taken.  The concern over whether or not they will remember her is representative of the potential impact upon the child’s life that she grapples with.

The second way that the work can be interpreted is as a commentary on slavery or race relations between whites and African Americans.  The imagery of figure of power and a controlled, unfairly locked away group is perfectly illustrated.  The lines, “With the swarmy feeling of African hands/Minute and shrunk for export” draws the reader to the conclusion that there is a disparity between the two races of people.  The double meaning of “African hands” invokes the use of African labor, slave or otherwise, with the past used term for a laborer, a hand.  This term was used for those workers on the lower strata of workers.  The turn of phrase “shrunk for export” invokes images of Africans being sold into slavery as a human commodity.

The box is representative of slavery and injustice, which by the end of the poem is promised to be temporal.  This leaves the promise of hope for the reader.  However, in the mean time, the lines ”So why should they turn on me?/ Tomorrow I will be sweet God, I will set them free” shows that the injustice lasts.  Why should the speaker wait until tomorrow to give freedom that was not theirs to restrict.  The fear shown in the first part of this line illustrates that there may be repercussions for the unjust actions of the past.