In this poem, Duffy analyses the nature of suicidal impulse, by letting a would-be suicide talk to us in the moments before her death. Like ‘The Captain of the 1964 Top Of the Form Team’, it is a dramatic monologue. The mood of the poem is reminiscent of ‘Havisham’, and in parts could almost be spoken by that character— echoes include the repeated words, the emphasis on colour (red/white), betrayal, (probably of a sexual nature), and the unhappiness that is transformed into attention seeking, the ‘look at me’ aspect, that is in many ways representative of the dramatic monologue. The poem revisits some of these ideas and also picks up on the life and death of the poet Sylvia Plath and her lifelong obsession with suicide.

Why do people commit suicide? This is a difficult thing to determine, not least because the reasons that recovered suicides give may not always be wholly honest, and suicide notes or last messages, both from suicides who succeed and those who don’t, may be continuing the dialogue with their loved ones that led to the suicide attempt in the first place.

Despite this, Duffy approaches her character confidently, certain of motivation. Statistics on teenage suicide suggest that boys are more likely to use violent methods (gun, rope, or knife), girls are more likely to choose those (overdose, drowning) from which they can be rescued. The usual analysis of this is that women are more likely than men to use suicide as a ‘cry for help’, as a way of dealing with issues that they cannot find help for, or as a way of focusing attention on their plight. The subtext of suicide, if you like, is that ‘I feel so unhappy that I could die—you would care if I died, so care about me now’

It seems as though Duffy is thinking of her speaker as someone in that latter category, someone uttering a ‘cry for help’ (the language throughout suggests this sort of interpretation), and so for the purposes of this commentary, I shall refer to the speaker of the poem as ‘she’.

‘The suicide’ The title can mean both the person and the act: the speaker here is subsumed by the act—almost becomes defined solely by it. We find out nothing about the speaker that is not related to the act—even the situation that prompts her to do it is hazy.

Small dark hours—the early morning hours are often referred to as the ‘small hours’. They are also dark. Early in the morning is the time when people are most likely to die—and also most likely to commit suicide. Here, the time itself becomes pinched and oppressive. It is a little reminiscent of ‘Mean Time’, and the ‘darkening sky’ and ‘endless nights’ in that poem, the darkness of night reflecting the dark mood of the speaker.

Bitter moon—makes me think of the famous Plath biography Bitter Fame. Again, the features of the night confirm the speaker’s mood. The moon is ‘bitter’, personified as someone with a grievance, someone disappointed or angry (one thinks of ‘bitter cold’ as well). This image, and the ones that follow, set the scene where the pathetic fallacy is used—that the landscape, or skyscape here, reflects the mood of the speaker. The world is dark and the moon angry because her feelings are dark and angry.

Buffed—polished. The clouds move across the face of the moon, momentarily obscuring it, then leaving it to shine more brightly, as a duster polishes something silver.

Smudgy—paradoxically, although they ‘polish’ the moon, the clouds themselves appear dirty or indistinct in the night sky—perhaps, to complete the image, in the same way as a duster grows more dirty as it cleans.

It gleams with resentment—the moon is less than grateful for the attention—like the speaker, perhaps, it does not seek brightness, but obscurity. Its shining is seen as resentment or anger against the clouds.

I dress in a shroud—Just as dress to an extent defines us, makes explicit the face that we wish to show to the world, so here the suicide’s dress, her habitual wear, is literally or metaphorically a shroud—she is thinking of her own death. We might be reminded here of Miss Havisham, dressing in the wedding dress that she expects to be buried in one day. To be buried in your wedding dress was usually something accorded to brides (you remain a bride for the first year after marriage). The speaker here could almost be a penitent, dressed in sackcloth, wearing the shroud as a reminder of mortality just as ascetics of an earlier age slept in their coffins so as to prepare themselves for their inevitable death, and ensure that they did not forget it.

Despair laced with a little glee—as though despair is a drink, the ‘laced’ suggests that the glee is the dangerous element.  You lace an innocuous drink with something stronger. Here, the delight that the speaker takes in the idea of suicide, in the despair that engenders it, is what makes the despair dangerous.

Leave it to me suggests that the person is in control. Rather like—for instance—Lady  Macbeth, another famous suicide. Just as Lady M tells her husband to ‘leave all the rest to me’ when she plans King Duncan’s murder, so the speaker here does not want to be interfered with, and yet also wants an audience to be aware of what she is doing, that she is in control. Killing oneself is seen as a way of taking control of your life.

Never never never / never enough—there are two possible readings here. Either the speaker is unable to be satisfied, or else she is saying that she is unable to satisfy someone else. In the first reading the speaker can’t get enough of something (love? attention?) that she needs, and the giver is seen to be failing her. So, for instance, her parents never gave her enough attention ‘never, never never enough’—no matter how much the parents gave it would never be enough. In the alternate reading, the speaker is being asked for something (success? love?) that she can’t give enough of, and the recipient is seen to be unreasonable in demanding more than it is possible to give. Here it would be the parents who were unreasonably demanding more, the ‘never enough’ becomes a cry of despair because of the impossibility of satisfying their demands. The tension between these two possible readings develops the character, as potentially both unsatisfied and also trying to please. The repeated ‘never’ suggests an edge of hysteria or anger.

The horrid smiling mouths / pout—smiles here are seen as threatening: dissatisfied or exaggerated ‘pouts’. The juxtaposition of ‘horrid’ with ‘smiling’ makes the speaker sound petulant herself. ‘Horrid’ is a rather unexpected, childish word to use here, though its connection to ‘horror’ is potent. It picks up on…

On the wallpaper—possibly a reference to The Yellow Wallpaper, a story by Charlotte Perkins Gilman that describes the slow decline into madness of a young woman suffering from depression. Her husband, a doctor, recommends complete quiet and takes her to stay in a rented, and rather dilapidated, country house. She becomes obsessed by the peeling yellow wallpaper in their bedroom, picturing figures and malevolent presences within it, and by the close of the story imagines herself to be trapped behind it. The speaker here imagines that she sees malignant smiles in the wallpaper pattern.

Kisses/ on a collar—in the words of the song, ‘lipstick on your collar/ told a tale on you/lipstick on your collar/ said you were untrue’. This is a suggestion that the anger of the speaker may be directed against a specific act of infidelity. It may also suggest the ‘collar’ of a slave. The consenting, beaten-down slave kisses the very collar by which she is imprisoned.

Lies. Blood.—the single, emphasised words almost tell a complete story. The history of a relationship, written in lies. Lies that lead to blood (perhaps the blood of the suicide). There is a sense that the whole story is told in these few words, that these are the important words.

‘My body is a blank page I will write on’—as for anorexics, bulimics, or people who tattoo, pierce, or mutilate themselves, the body here is a canvas for the speaker’s self-expression. Perhaps feelings are being expressed here—of rebellion or impotence—that cannot be expressed in other ways. Her body at least belongs to the speaker, and she can do as she wishes with it—even destroy it. Sylvia Plath is a crucial influence here. Her late poem ‘Edge’ similarly takes a view of suicide as self-expression, even as high art: ‘The woman is perfected/ Her dead / Body wears the smile of accomplishment’

Famous—people who are famous sometimes become more so when they die young, even if it is by accident (think of James Dean or River Phoenix or Paula Yates). The glamour of someone dying young (much over-rated!) is exaggerated if they kill themselves, because to the sense of tragedy that exists when a life is lost is added a projection of the despair felt by someone so apparently happy. The speaker imagines joining a list of famous suicides. People like Sylvia Plath, Marilyn Monroe, Kurt Cobain, or Michael Hutchence.

Nobody drinks with their whole face—meaning that no one is altogether one thing? You drink with your mouth—to say that you drink with your whole face would be to caricature or exaggerate. Like defining someone as ‘a drinker’, as though this was the only thing of note about them. Does this mean that someone who does, like the speaker, is completely involved? Out of control?

‘I do.’ ‘Mine are’. The assertion that the speaker is unusual: the one person in the world who feels things completely, who takes things to extremes? There is the same feeling here as in Duffy’s ‘Stealing’, that the speaker is asserting something about themselves that they believe no-one is able to truly access: ‘You don’t understand a word I’m saying, do you?’

Nobody’s ears are confessionals—reminiscent of the rather negative view of the confessional in ‘Confession’. The speaker is asserting either that she is uniquely afflicted or uniquely special. No-one (except for her) has the patience to just sit and listen. No-one (except for her) has to endure it.

Eyes like squids. Sexy—Squids’ eyes are cold, lidless, and large in proportion to their body—so eyes like suids might mean large, staring eyes. The eyes of the Atlantic giant squid are the largest of any animal, as large as dinner plates, 18 inches across. The image suggests something that is the reverse of ‘sexy’, the comment is either ironic or perverse. The emphasis in these lines is on the speaker’s senses. Huge mouth, huge ears, huge eyes

I get out the knives—this works at a number of levels. The speaker may be getting out ‘the knives’ so as to prepare herself for what sounds like an almost ritualistic death—note that they are specific knives, she doesn’t get out any old knife. Is this because they have been used before? It is again reminiscent of Lady M to have the plural (give me the daggers). How many do you need? The plural ‘knives’ increases the ritualistic feel. At another level, it sounds as though the speaker is about to criticise/do a hatchet job. To ‘get out the knives’ can be a synonym for saying hurtful things about someone. Is the speaker’s last communication going to be a vindictive one?

Who wants /a bloody valentine’ Firstly, literally, a valentine card, with a big red heart on it, but here grotesque—her real heart is pumping out blood in a gesture of love and hate. Valentine’s cards are often an awkward or desperate way of trying to communicate. Her proposed death is a message, a last communication with those she loves.

At one level, this could be the disappointed cry of someone without a card on Valentine’s day—asserting, to cover hurt, that they think the whole business is ridiculous. I am independent, is the message, I don’t need your love tokens. In this reading, ‘bloody’ becomes simply an expletive—who wants a silly valentine.

At another level, the cry becomes a threat. Literally bloody, this act of suicide will be an indication to you of how much I love you. Do you want this bloody, this bleeding, token of my devotion? Or does it scare you?

The comparison with the other unusual valentine’s gift in ‘Valentine’ is irresistible. The knives are out there also.

Pumping—the heart keeps pumping blood for as long as it can, even when wounded. The speaker’s heart pumps out love and hate, mirroring an uncertainty about her feelings.

Love hate love—reminiscent of Havisham’s ‘Love’s / hate behind a white veil’. The feelings of the speaker switch from one to the other. Is the act of suicide an expression of despairing love, or of vengeful hate? The speaker seems unable to decide.

Utterly selfless—again, a double meaning. Selfless means unselfish, it also means devoid of character or of self. The speaker affects to be unselfish, but also states their own emptiness.

 I lie back under the lightbulb—the bare lightbulb is like that in ‘Room’, seeming to symbolise the loneliness of the suicide, the incompleteness of her surroundings. Her room, her home, is temporary and unfurnished. The woman lies back, the light shines upon her, as she prepares for death. She doesn’t need to turn the lights off as you do when going to sleep—quite the reverse, she wants light to emphasise what she is going to do. The image is reminiscent of the ultimate destination of the suicide—the mortuary table where her body will be examined.

‘Something like a cat’— as though there is some sort of possession going on, the speaker imagines an entity inside their head that is spiteful to others, clawing at and hurting them. Perhaps an image of mental illness, this suggests for the first time that the speaker may not, after all, feel totally in control of what she is doing. Responsibility is shifted to the ‘cat’. It’s not her fault. A ‘cat’ is also a colloquial (though rather old-fashioned) term for a spiteful woman. The word survives as the adjective ‘catty’.

Fuck off and Worship represent the two extremes of feeling. One is dismissive (I just want to disappear, I hate the world) another is self-regarding (look at me, I can gain importance by this act). It mirrors the relationship between despair and egotism.

‘This will kill my folks’ picks up on both ideas. Dramatic irony in that this is a subtext (her ‘folks’ won’t really die), an image, affecting to be a literal text (i.e., that they will die of grief as a result of her act, it can be predicted with certainty).

The subtext of ‘kill’ here (they’ll regret it) undercuts the literal ‘text’ of the act of suicide. Because she is using ‘kill’ as a metaphor for regret, it reflects this regret upon her. The act will literally kill her, just as it will figuratively kill her ‘folks’, and this introduces the implied subtext of regret to her own actions (I’ll regret it).

Edge