‘Come on, give us a smile.’

I sat on the pink velvet love-seat in Jay Cee’s office, holding a paper rose and facing the magazine photographer. I was the last of the twelve to have my picture taken. I had tried concealing myself in the powder-room, but it didn’t work. Betsy had spied my feet under the doors.

I didn’t want my picture taken because I was going to cry. I didn’t know why I was going to cry, but I knew that if anybody spoke to me or looked at me too closely the tears would fly out of my eyes and the sobs would fly out of my throat and I’d cry for a week. I could feel the tears brimming and sloshong in me like water in a glass that is unsteady and too full........

’She wants,’ said Jay Cee wittily, ‘to be everything.’

I said I wanted to be a poet.

Then they scouted about for something for me to hold.

Jay Cee suggested a book of poems, but the photographer said no, that was too obvious. It should be something that showed what inspired the poems. Finally Jay Cee unclipped the single, long-stemmed paper rose from her latest hat.

The photographer fiddled with his hot white lights. ‘Show us how happy it makes you to write a poem.’

-Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar