“I'm doped and thick from my last sleeping pill.”

“Now I am silent, hateUp to my neck,Thick, thick.I do not speak.--from "Lesbos", written 18 October 1962”

“I have taken a pill to killThe thinPapery feeling.--from "Cut", written 24 October 1962”

“Whenever I'm sad I'm going to die, or so nervous I can't sleep, or in love with somebody I won't be seeing for a week, I slump down just so far and then I say: 'I'll go take a hot bath.”

“Your shelled bed I remember.Father, this thick air is murderous.I would breathe water.”

“There must be quite a few things a hot bath won't cure, but I don't know many of them. Whenever I'm sad I'm going to die, or so nervous I can't sleep, or in love with somebody I won't be seeing for a week, I slump down just so far and then I say: "I'll go take a hot bath.”

“When they asked some old Roman philosopher or other how he wanted to die, he said he would open his veins in a warm bath. I thought it would be easy, lying in the tup and seeing the redness flower from my wrists, flush after flush through the clear water, till I sank into sleep under a surface gaudy as poppies.”