The Full Text of “Sheep in Fog”
The Full Text of “Sheep in Fog”
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“Sheep in Fog” Introduction
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Sylvia Plath's "Sheep in Fog" explores the speaker's intense feelings of disappointment, despair, and insignificance. The speaker feels like they've been trudging too slowly through life and have failed to live up to their promise and potential. They've let down other people and even fate itself, and they can't see a way forward through the thick, all-consuming fog of their despair. In the end, the poem suggests that the only relief is the oblivion of death, a dark, empty "heaven" where neither expectations nor disappointments exist. Plath wrote the poem shortly before her death in 1962. It was published in 1965 as part of the posthumous collection, Ariel.
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“Sheep in Fog” Summary
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The speaker describes a landscape that disappears into the mist. Other people, or maybe even the stars themselves, look down on the speaker with pity. The speaker feels like they've failed everyone.
A train goes by, exhaling smoke. A horse, whose coat is the color of corroded metal, moves slowly, the clomp of its hooves ringing out like the mournful chimes of a bell.
The day just keeps getting gloomier and gloomier, like a flower that's been left to wither.
The speaker feels a stillness deep in their very bones, while distant, unreachable fields are making their heart melt.
These feelings might kill the speaker, granting them access to a heaven where there are no stars and no God, the dark waters of death and oblivion.
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“Sheep in Fog” Themes
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Hopelessness, Disappointment, and Despair
“Sheep in Fog” describes a crushing sense of insignificance and the despair that results from feeling unimportant or unseen. The speaker feels they’ve failed to live up to their potential, falling short of other people’s expectations for them and maybe even their own destiny. Their life seems to have gone stagnant, and they can’t see their way out of the present, unbearable moment they're in. The poem offers no relief or silver lining for the pain that the speaker is experiencing; it suggests that despair and disappointment are like a thick “fog” that's almost impossible to see beyond.
The poem begins with the speaker admitting that they feel more or less like a failure. “People or stars” are “disappoint[ed]” in them, suggesting that the speaker has let down those around them and even fate itself (represented here by those “stars”). The speaker feels about as ordinary and confused as a “sheep” wandering around in a misty landscape.
The "slow[ness]" of the horse the speaker is riding (which might also be a metaphorical reference to a passing train) further suggests that the speaker has fallen behind. They're not where they expected to be by this point in their life, it seems, and it's too late to turn things around; this horse is “the colour of rust,” already old and falling apart, and the sounds of its clomping “[h]ooves” are like “dolorous” (or mournful) “bells.” This might subtly evoke the sad chime of a funeral service, suggesting that the only place the speaker is moving towards now is death.
Projecting these feelings of insignificance and hopelessness onto the landscape, the speaker says that “the morning has been blackening,” or growing ever darker, and decaying as if it were “a flower left out.” This flower might also refer to the speaker themselves; either way, this grim imagery implies that the speaker's future, which had once seemed bright and promising, is now wilted and without color, growing less hopeful by the hour.
The poem offers no solace in the end, suggesting instead that one of the most difficult parts of the speaker’s hopelessness is not being able to see beyond it. The “hills” around the speaker “step off into whiteness”; there's no seeing where they lead and the speaker thus has nowhere to go. They feel a terrible “stillness” deep in their very "bones," a kind of stagnancy that sounds a lot like death.
Meanwhile, distant fields "melt” the speaker's “heart”—an ambiguous metaphor that might reflect how the sight of far of fields hurts (or simply rouses intense emotions in) the speaker because the speaker can't reach them. Such feelings may very well “let [the speaker] through to a heaven” that is strangely empty, “starless and fatherless.” In other words, they could kill the speaker, pushing them through the fog into the oblivion of death—which the speaker perhaps calls "heaven" only because it offers an escape from the endless despair and expectations of life.
Where this theme appears in the poem:- Lines 1-15
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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Sheep in Fog”
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Line 1
The hills step off into whiteness.
The poem's title, "Sheep in Fog," sets the scene: readers might picture the speaker looking out on a misty landscape filled with sheep. Though these sheep don't actually appear in the poem itself, their mention in the title might suggest a few things about the speaker's state of mind:
- Sheep have fluffy, white coats and tend to stick together in herds. Add fog to the mix, and you'd have a hard time telling individual sheep apart. Perhaps, then, the poem's title reflects the speaker's own feelings of ordinariness. That is, maybe they feel like they're nothing more than an unexceptional "sheep" obscured by fog. (Note that people also use the word "sheep" to refer to people who mindlessly follow the crowd or conform to social norms.)
- The mention of "fog" might also suggest that the speaker feels lost and confused.
- Even before the poem begins, then, readers might sense the speaker's anxiety about failing to stand out from the crowd and/or to find their way.
The poem itself then begins with the speaker describing "hills" that "step off into whiteness." The speaker is personifying the "hills" by granting them the ability to wander off "into whiteness"—a dense patch of fog that the speaker can't see beyond.
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Lines 2-3
People or stars ...
... I disappoint them. -
Lines 4-7
The train leaves ...
... Hooves, dolorous bells— -
Lines 8-10
All morning the ...
... flower left out. -
Lines 11-15
My bones hold ...
... a dark water.
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“Sheep in Fog” Symbols
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Stars
The stars in this poem symbolize the speaker's destiny.
This is often the case in literature: think of Shakespeare's famous star-crossed lovers (or even the young adult novel The Fault in Our Stars, whose title is another allusion to Shakespeare!).
When the speaker says that the "stars / Regard me sadly," this suggests that the whole universe, even fate itself, looks down on the speaker with pity and disappointment. This is because the speaker hasn't lived up to their destiny; they've failed to accomplish the very things they were put on this earth to do.
At the end of the poem, the speaker says that their overwhelming feelings of despair put them in danger of entering "a heaven" that is both "[s]tarless and fatherless, a dark water." The absence of stars in this scenario suggests that in death, there is no destiny—and therefore no feelings of failure.
Where this symbol appears in the poem:- Lines 2-3: “People or stars / Regard me sadly, I disappoint them.”
- Lines 13-15: “They threaten / To let me through to a heaven / Starless and fatherless, a dark water.”
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Morning
Morning is usually a symbol of new beginnings, fresh starts, and potential. As the sun rises on a new day, people may be filled with a sense of thrilling hopefulness. Yet the morning of "Sheep in Fog" is just getting darker and darker; the speaker says that "all morning," the "morning" itself has been "blackening." This darkening morning represents the dimming of the speaker's hopes, the sun setting on their potential. They're quickly running out of time to make good on the promise of the new day, and soon it will be too late.
Where this symbol appears in the poem:- Lines 8-9: “All morning the / Morning has been blackening,”
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The Flower
Flowers, much like the morning, usually symbolize potential, vitality, beauty, and so forth. They bloom in spring, a season itself symbolically linked with freshness and rebirth. That the flower in this poem has been "left out" thus represents the loss of the speaker's hopes and potential. The speaker's youth, beauty, and talent have been abandoned or forgotten, left to wilt in the cold rather than tended to.
Where this symbol appears in the poem:- Line 10: “A flower left out.”
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Whiteness/Fog
The "whiteness" of line 1 isn't just a description of the foggy landscape; it also symbolizes the speaker's feelings of obscurity, confusion, and invisibility.
The speaker portrays the "hills" not as stationary objects shrouded by mist, but as personified entities that "step off" into the bleary distance. And in the seemingly disappearing "hills," the speaker catches sight of their own disappearing self—a self who is unable to see the future clearly and who is likewise unseen by those around them.
Where this symbol appears in the poem:- Line 1: “The hills step off into whiteness.”
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The Slow Horse
The "slow / Horse" of stanza 2 might be an actual horse that the speaker is riding, or it might be a metaphor for the passing train. Either way, it also symbolizes the speaker themselves and their anxiety/despair about their pace in life. That is, the speaker feels like they haven't lived up to their own potential, and have failed to meet the world's expectations for them. They're moving along the path of life too slowly. The fact that the horse is "the colour of rust" further suggests the speaker's own feelings of decay/growing stiff and stale from disuse (perhaps because they haven't used their talents enough).
Where this symbol appears in the poem:- Lines 5-7: “O slow / Horse the colour of rust, / Hooves, dolorous bells—”
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“Sheep in Fog” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language
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Imagery
The poem uses evocative and sometimes ambiguous imagery to illustrate the speaker's confusion and pain. In the first line, for instance, the speaker says that the "hills step off into whiteness." This visual of a landscape shrouded in mist reflects the speaker's own sense of being lost and alone, overcome by an oppressive "fog" of despair. The speaker is subtly personifying the hills here as well, treating them as though they're taking a dangerous "step" into the unknown.
In the second stanza, the speaker describes a passing "train," saying that it "leaves a line of breath" as it cuts across the landscape. While the speaker never says what season the poem takes place in, this imagery might call to mind the way that one's breath looks in the cold, thereby casting a chill over the poem. The train, like the hills in the first stanza, also seems alive here, like a presence sighing past the speaker (perhaps in another gesture of "disappointment").
The speaker then switches gears, describing a "slow / Horse the colour of rust." This might refer to a literal horse (one that, presumably, the speaker is riding) or it might be a metaphor for the train. Either way, it seems to symbolize the speaker's own life, which feels to them like a creaky, plodding animal.
What's clear, above all, from this imagery is that the speaker feels as if they've fallen behind, that they've missed the "train" and are instead proceeding at an almost crawl, their horse practically "rust[ing]" beneath them as they go. They even describe the "[h]ooves" of this horse as "dolorous bells," sonic imagery that might make readers think of the mournful tolling of funeral bells. Perhaps the speaker fears moving so slowly that they'll die before they reach their goal—or perhaps they feel like they're already dead.
The speaker goes on to say that "the / [m]orning has been blackening" (or getting darker and gloomier), like "a flower left out." The world around the speaker seems as dark and dismal as their own mind. Like the horse, this flower symbolizes the speaker themselves: though once chosen—"picked" like a pretty flower—the speaker has since been forgotten, left to wilt and decay. Also note that both the morning and flowers usually suggest positive things like hope, renewal, youth, and vitality. The fact that these things are "blackening" and wilting thus implies that the speaker feels no hope. For the speaker, the future seems to have already withered on the vine.
Where imagery appears in the poem:- Line 1: “The hills step off into whiteness.”
- Lines 4-9: “The train leaves a line of breath. / O slow / Horse the colour of rust, / Hooves, dolorous bells— / All morning the / Morning has been blackening,”
- Line 10: “A flower left out.”
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Personification
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Metaphor
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Diacope
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Enjambment
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Sibilance
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Alliteration
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Assonance
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Asyndeton
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"Sheep in Fog" Vocabulary
Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.
- Regard
- O
- Colour
- Dolorous
- Blackening
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(Location in poem: Line 3: “Regard me sadly, I disappoint them.”)
Look at or think about something.
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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Sheep in Fog”
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Form
"Sheep in Fog" is a free verse poem whose 15 lines are arranged in five tercets (three-line stanzas). These short stanzas draw out the poem, in doing so perhaps evoking the "slow," plodding gait of the horse/train pictured. Whereas a single stanza might have lent the poem a sense of speed and urgency, adding regular stanza breaks—and thus more white space to the page—suggests the speaker's own stagnation, their inability to shake the metaphorical "stillness" from their "bones."
The uniformity of these tercets might also subtly evoke the titular sheep, which all look the same from afar (especially through "fog"). Each stanza is likewise the same length, and they all might seem identical, form-wise, when viewed from a distance.
Plath used tercets in many of her later poems (including "Ariel," "Fever 103," and "Lady Lazarus"). The number three shows up in Plath's work in other ways as well, such as the number of voices in her dramatic poem "Three Women." There are many potential reasons why Plath might have been drawn to this form towards the end of her life. In this poem in particular, with its reference to the "stars" (which commonly symbolize destiny) in the first stanza and its suggestion of death at the end, it's possible Plath was thinking of the three Fates from Greek mythology. The Fates were in charge of each person's destiny, represented by a thread: one spun this thread of life, another measured it, and the third cut it.
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Meter
As is typical of Plath's poetry, and of contemporary poetry more generally, "Sheep in Fog" is a free verse poem and thus has no meter.
Free verse had become the norm by the time Plath began writing. Here, the lack of meter keeps the poem's language sounding natural, allowing the reader to feel as if they're getting a peek into the speaker's mind. Instead of strict meter, Plath here relies on strong, propulsive imagery and lots of short, jagged lines to evoke the speaker's raw feelings of despair.
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Rhyme Scheme
As a free verse poem, "Sheep in Fog" doesn't use a rhyme scheme. While rhyme might have made the poem more musical, the lack of rhyme allows the poem to feel more true to the speaker's experience. The speaker's feelings of stagnation aren't beautiful; they're unbearable. By eschewing rhyme, the poem is able to be as spare and precise as possible, cutting right to the heart of the speaker's overwhelming sense of despair.
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“Sheep in Fog” Speaker
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Readers never learn anything about the speaker of this poem apart from the fact that this person feels deeply lost and alone. Like the titular sheep wandering around in a dense fog, the speaker seems to have meandered off the path laid out for them by other "people" or by the "stars" of destiny, and they can't seem to get back on track. They feel stuck, stagnant, and like they will never find a way out of the obscuring "fog" of despair.
Plath wrote this poem a few weeks before her death by suicide. While readers shouldn't take all of Plath's speakers as direct stand-ins for the poet herself, it's hard not to see Plath's own struggles reflected in the speaker's pain. Like the speaker, Plath felt stuck at the time she wrote this poem; her marriage had failed, the winter was bleak, and though she was writing the poems that would make her famous after her death, her career was not taking off in the way she had hoped.
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“Sheep in Fog” Setting
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The poem takes place on a foggy day. There are "hills" that seem to "step off into whiteness" (i.e., they're consumed by fog). There's also a "train" emitting smoke, which the speaker compares to "a line of breath" in the cold. It's "morning," and there are "fields" in the distance.
Plath actually wrote an introduction for this poem in which she said, "In this poem, the speaker's horse is proceeding at a slow, cold walk down a hill of macadam to the stable at the bottom. It is December. It is foggy. In the fog there are sheep." Yet the poem itself is much less straightforward.
It isn't clear, for example, whether the "slow / Horse" is meant to be a literal horse, a metaphor for the train, or even a metaphor for the speaker's own body. Likewise, the poem's title is "Sheep in Fog," yet the poem doesn't ever mention sheep at all. These sheep might be a literal part of the landscape, or they might be a metaphor for the speaker's feelings of being ordinary or indistinguishable from those around her.
Part of what makes the poem's setting so powerful is the fact that it is difficult to tell whether descriptions are meant to be taken literally or not. The landscape seems at once real and like a reflection of the speaker's inner world. The speaker seems physically surrounded by their misery, unable to distract themselves from the intense feelings that "threaten" to overwhelm them.
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Literary and Historical Context of “Sheep in Fog”
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Literary Context
The American poet Sylvia Plath wrote "Sheep in Fog" in December of 1962, though she revised it dramatically in January of 1963. There's no way to know if she meant to continue working on the poem, as she died by suicide only a few weeks later. The revised version of the poem is much bleaker than the first draft, which originally concluded with the following lines:
Patriarchs till now immobile
In heavenly wools
Row off as stones or clouds with the faces of babiesThe revised ending, however, reflects some common motifs in Plath's work: an absent father figure (the subject of her poem "Daddy"), rigid "stars" (representing one's destiny), and a sinister fate involving "dark water." In fact, this poem bears a strong resemblance to Plath's "Words," which was written only a few weeks later and which also ends with the speaker envisioning themselves "at the bottom of a pool."
"Sheep in Fog" might also be considered a sister poem to "Ariel," as both were partly inspired by Plath's time taking horseback riding lessons. Plath wrote in her introduction to "Ariel" that this was the name of a horse she was "especially fond of," and she also described the speaker of "Sheep in Fog" as riding a horse in December fog.
Like many of the poems that Plath wrote in the last five months of her life, "Sheep in Fog" features distinctive, hallucinogenic imagery that may have been a result of her writing habits at this time. She wrote 26 of the poems that would eventually make up Ariel and Other Poems in frantic bursts, often during the night or early morning when she was unable to sleep. It was a period of isolation for Plath, who was still living in England after her separation from her husband, the English poet Ted Hughes. She was left to look after her two children (who were often sick) in a house without a telephone, whose pipes had frozen during one of the coldest winters in a century. The feelings of stagnancy and despair expressed in this poem, then, seem to reflect what Plath was experiencing in her own life.
This intensity of subject matter and autobiographical nature of the poem makes it an example of confessional poetry, a mode of poetry with which Plath is often associated.
Historical Context
Plath was born in 1932. The U.S. of the midcentury, and particularly suburbia, where Plath was raised, was typically a place of stifling social expectations. Women were under extraordinary strain to look and act a certain way, to keep themselves sexually "pure" for marriage, and to set aside their own needs and desires in the service of creating the perfect domestic life promised to men in the wake of World War II.
Plath also struggled with mental illness throughout her life, and in the months leading up to her suicide was in the middle of a particularly bad depressive episode. While Plath had performed exceptionally in school and was already gaining recognition as a serious writer by the age of 30, she undoubtedly saw the implosion of her marriage to poet Ted Hughes as a failure. In the wake of their separation, she struggled to maintain a balance between writing and caring for her two young children. Plath had exacting expectations for herself that were reinforced not only by society, but also by her mother. Considering this context, the poem seems to demonstrate the suffocating impact of social, cultural, and familial expectations.
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More “Sheep in Fog” Resources
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External Resources
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The Poet's Life and Legacy — A biography of Plath from the Poetry Foundation.
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The Poem Read Aloud — Listen to a recording of the poem.
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Plath's Horseback Riding Lessons — A blogpost from Gail Crowther, a researcher who specializes in Plath, about the farm that partially inspired both "Sheep in Fog" and "Ariel."
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"Crash Course" Introduction to Plath's Work — Author John Green talks about Plath's work for his web series, Crash Course Literature.
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A Glimpse at Plath's Revision Process — An auction listing for draft revisions of "Sheep in Fog," which discusses the significance of being able to peek into the poet's revision process at this pivotal point in her life.
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LitCharts on Other Poems by Sylvia Plath
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