Edna St. Vincent Millay

    O world, I cannot hold thee close enough!
        Thy winds, thy wide grey skies!
        Thy mists, that roll and rise!
    Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag
    And all but cry with colour!    That gaunt crag
    To crush!    To lift the lean of that black bluff!
    World, World, I cannot get thee close enough!


    Long have I known a glory in it all,
            But never knew I this;
            Here such a passion is
    As stretcheth me apart,--Lord, I do fear
    Thou'st made the world too beautiful this year;
    My soul is all but out of me,--let fall
    No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.

Was it for this I uttered prayers,
And sobbed and cursed and kicked the stairs,
That now, domestic as a plate,
I should retire at half-past eight?

    I said,--for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come,--
        "I'll hear his step and know his step when I am warm in bed;
    But I'll never leave my pillow, though there be some
        As would let him in--and take him in with tears!" I said.
    I lay,--for Love was laggard, O, he came not until dawn,--
        I lay and listened for his step and could not get to sleep;
    And he found me at my window with my big cloak on,
        All sorry with the tears some folks might weep!

        People that build their houses inland,
            People that buy a plot of ground
        Shaped like a house, and build a house there,
            Far from the sea-board, far from the sound

        Of water sucking the hollow ledges,
            Tons of water striking the shore,--
        What do they long for, as I long for
            One salt smell of the sea once more?

        People the waves have not awakened,
            Spanking the boats at the harbor's head,
        What do they long for, as I long for,--
            Starting up in my inland bed,

        Beating the narrow walls, and finding
            Neither a window nor a door,
        Screaming to God for death by drowning,--
            One salt taste of the sea once mor...

    The room is full of you!--As I came in
    And closed the door behind me, all at once
    A something in the air, intangible,
    Yet stiff with meaning, struck my senses sick!--

    Sharp, unfamiliar odors have destroyed
    Each other room's dear personality.
    The heavy scent of damp, funereal flowers,--
    The very essence, hush-distilled, of Death--
    Has strangled that habitual breath of home
    Whose expiration leaves all houses dead;
    And wheresoe'er I look is hideous change.
    Save here.    Here 'twas as if a weed-choked gate
    Had opened at my touch, and I had stepped
    Into some long-forgot, enchanted, strange,
    Sweet garden of a thousand years ago
    And suddenly thought, "I have been here before!"

    You are not...

        Ah, could I lay me down in this long grass
        And close my eyes, and let the quiet wind
        Blow over me--I am so tired, so tired
        Of passing pleasant places!    All my life,
        Following Care along the dusty road,
        Have I looked back at loveliness and sighed;
        Yet at my hand an unrelenting hand
        Tugged ever, and I passed.    All my life long
        Over my shoulder have I looked at peace;
        And now I fain would lie in this long grass
        And close my eyes.
            Yet onward!
                        Cat birds call
        Through the long afternoon, and creeks at dusk
        Are guttural.    Whip-poor-wills wake and cry,
        Drawing the twilight close about their throats.
        Only my he...

    Am I kin to Sorrow,
        That so oft
    Falls the knocker of my door--
        Neither loud nor soft,
    But as long accustomed,
        Under Sorrow's hand?
    Marigolds around the step
        And rosemary stand,
    And then comes Sorrow--
        And what does Sorrow care
    For the rosemary
        Or the marigolds there?
    Am I kin to Sorrow?
        Are we kin?
    That so oft upon my door--
        *Oh, come in*!

        Listen, children:
        Your father is dead.
        From his old coats
        I'll make you little jackets;
        I'll make you little trousers
        From his old pants.
        There'll be in his pockets
        Things he used to put there,
        Keys and pennies
        Covered with tobacco;
        Dan shall have the pennies
        To save in his bank;
        Anne shall have the keys
        To make a pretty noise with.
        Life must go on,
        And the dead be forgotten;
        Life must go on,
        Though good men die;
        Anne, eat your breakfast;
        Dan, take your medicine;
        Life must go on;
        I forget just why.

        These wet rocks where the tide has been,
            Barnacled white and weeded brown
        And slimed beneath to a beautiful green,
            These wet rocks where the tide went down
        Will show again when the tide is high
            Faint and perilous, far from shore,
        No place to dream, but a place to die,--
            The bottom of the sea once more.
        There was a child that wandered through
            A giant's empty house all day,--
        House full of wonderful things and new,
            But no fit place for a child to play.

As I went walking up and down to take the evening air,
    (Sweet to meet upon the street, why must I be so shy?)
I saw him lay his hand upon her torn black hair;
    ("Little dirty Latin child, let the lady by!")

The women squatting on the stoops were slovenly and fat,
    (Lay me out in organdie, lay me out in lawn!)
And everywhere I stepped there was a baby or a cat;
    (Lord God in Heaven, will it never be dawn?)

The fruit-carts and clam-carts were ribald as a fair,
    (Pink nets and wet shells trodden under heel)
She had haggled from the fruit-man of his rotting ware;
    (I shall never get to sleep, the way I feel!)

He walked like a king through the filth and the clutter,
    (Sweet to meet upon the street, why did you glance me by?)
But he cau...

        Butterflies are white and blue
        In this field we wander through.
        Suffer me to take your hand.
        Death comes in a day or two.

        All the things we ever knew
        Will be ashes in that hour,
        Mark the transient butterfly,
        How he hangs upon the flower.

        Suffer me to take your hand.
        Suffer me to cherish you
        Till the dawn is in the sky.
        Whether I be false or true,
        Death comes in a day or two.

[VASSAR COLLEGE, 1918]


        Oh, loveliest throat of all sweet throats,
            Where now no more the music is,
        With hands that wrote you little notes
            I write you little elegies!

Cut if you will, with Sleep's dull knife,
    Each day to half its length, my friend,--
The years that Time takes off my life,
    He'll take from off the other end!

            Aye, but she?
            Your other sister and my other soul
            Grave Silence, lovelier
            Than the three loveliest maidens, what of her?
            Clio, not you,
            Not you, Calliope,
            Nor all your wanton line,
            Not Beauty's perfect self shall comfort me
            For Silence once departed,
            For her the cool-tongued, her the tranquil-hearted,
            Whom evermore I follow wistfully,
        Wandering Heaven and Earth and Hell and the four seasons through;
        Thalia, not you,
        Not you, Melpomene,
        Not your incomparable feet, O thin Terpsichore,
        I seek in this great hall,
        But one more pale, more pensive, most beloved of you all.
        I se...

        Death devours all lovely things;
            Lesbia with her sparrow
        Shares the darkness,--presently
            Every bed is narrow.

        Unremembered as old rain
            Dries the sheer libation,
        And the little petulant hand
            Is an annotation.

        After all, my erstwhile dear,
            My no longer cherished,
        Need we say it was not love,
            Now that love is perished?

        If it were only still!--
        With far away the shrill
        Crying of a cock;
        Or the shaken bell
        From a cow's throat
        Moving through the bushes;
        Or the soft shock
        Of wizened apples falling
        From an old tree
        In a forgotten orchard
        Upon the hilly rock!

        Oh, grey hill,
        Where the grazing herd
        Licks the purple blossom,
        Crops the spiky weed!
        Oh, stony pasture,
        Where the tall mullein
        Stands up so sturdy
        On its little seed!

Before she has her floor swept
    Or her dishes done,
Any day you'll find her
    A-sunning in the sun!

It's long after midnight
    Her key's in the lock,
And you never see her chimney smoke
    Till past ten o'clock!

She digs in her garden
    With a shovel and a spoon,
She weeds her lazy lettuce
    By the light of the moon,

She walks up the walk
    Like a woman in a dream,
She forgets she borrowed butter
    And pays you back cream!

Her lawn looks like a meadow,
    And if she mows the place
She leaves the clover standing
    And the Queen Anne's lace!

        Be to her, Persephone,
        All the things I might not be;
        Take her head upon your knee.
        She that was so proud and wild,
        Flippant, arrogant and free,
        She that had no need of me,
        Is a little lonely child
        Lost in Hell,--Persephone,
        Take her head upon your knee;
        Say to her, "My dear, my dear,
        It is not so dreadful here."




CHORUS

        Give away her gowns,
        Give away her shoes;
        She has no more use
        For her fragrant gowns;
        Take them all down,
        Blue, green, blue,
        Lilac, pink, blue,
        From their padded hangers;
        She will dance no more
        In her narrow shoes;
     ...