The Speaker
The unnamed first-person speaker is in a church graveyard adjacent to her house. She feels disoriented by the eerie landscape, which includes a moon personified as an uncaring mother and a yew tree seeking, but not quite reaching, the moon. Although the poem never presents itself as an autobiographical piece, some readings speculate that the speaker is Plath herself, and that the poem is about the poet’s relationship with her parents (the moon symbolizing her mother Aurelia Plath, the yew tree her father Otto Plath).
The Moon
The moon (a white full moon resembling a human face) is personified as a mother who is unhospitable, apathetic, and emotionally detached from the speaker. Unlike the Virgin Mary, the moon does not offer maternal warmth. While the night grows more and more ghostly with clouds flowering in the sky and (images of) saints in the church hanging above the pews, the moon disregards them all.
The Yew Tree
The yew tree in the church yard points upward to the moon. Like the moon, it is speechless and motionless, its final “message” (Line 28) being its own silence and black color. Despite its unreachability, the yew connects with the speaker as they both look towards the moon, their gaze unreciprocated by the face in the sky.
