Source
of book: I own this.
I
picked this book up used from the library - a random find that cost next to
nothing. I will confess that I hadn’t read anything by Edna St. Vincent Millay
since my high school days, and I didn’t remember that much about the
experience. In retrospect, I think it is likely that I was given one of her
“safe” poems, one that tends to get picked by literature courses, rather than
her more dangerous and radical ones.
In
any event, I was immediately taken by this collection - it is fantastic. It was
one of the more pleasant surprises in this year’s reading. I am a great lover
of sonnets anyway. The form itself speaks to me (and indeed, my pathetic
attempts at poetry during high school were often in sonnet form), and hers are
some of the best I have read.
Edna
St. Vincent Millay was a fascinating character. Living and writing mostly
during the first half of the 20th Century, she refused to adhere to convention.
She was raised by a divorced mother, whose poverty was in contrast to her
dedication to introducing her daughters to classic literature. All three
daughters were infamous at school for speaking their minds. Edna herself
insisted in being called by her middle name: Vincent. Her teacher refused,
calling her by random female names starting with V. (The name comes from the
St. Vincent hospital, where Millay’s uncle was saved from death at one point.)
Millay
was openly bisexual, documenting relationships with women from her teens. Many
of her poems are about love between women, which caused some scandal during her
lifetime. (Although, to be fair, times were less puritanical in the 1920s than
they would become later.) Millay would eventually marry in her 30s, after a
number of love affairs with both men and women, having refused multiple offers
of marriage, gotten pregnant, and had an abortion. The marriage was explicitly
an open relationship, with both spouses continuing to have affairs with others.
Her husband (like her) was strongly feminist, and fully supported her work. In
fact, he took primary responsibility for domestic duties.
In
1936, she was flung from an automobile in a freak accident, and suffered
significant nerve and spinal damage. In constant pain for the rest of her life,
she became addicted to morphine and alcohol, which contributed to her death at
age 58.
Even
more tragic than that, however, was the tale of her career. She had previously
been opposed to war, but, seeing the dangers of Fascism long before most of her
fellow artists, she strongly advocated in favor of the United States entering
World War II. This led to her essentially being blacklisted in artistic
circles, effectively ending her career. At the same time, pro-Fascist poets
such as Ezra Pound continued to receive accolades.
Millay
wrote about 160 sonnets, about the same as Shakespeare. They are not all
related in the same way, but there are definitely themes that flow through most
of them. There are three sonnet sets, both of which are haunting and moving.
The first is Sonnets from an Ungrafted Tree, which tells, over the
course of 17 poems, the story of a wife caring for her dying husband who she
separated from years ago. The second is The Harp Weaver, a tale of a
mother who freezes to death creating a lavish wardrobe for her child. It is not
difficult to see in both of these a reflection of Millay’s mother, whose life
was harshly circumscribed by her failed marriage to a worthless man, and her
need to sacrifice herself to keep her children fed. The third collection is Fatal
Interview, believed to have been written about a long term relationship of
hers which had ended. It is a devastating look at love, loss, and the ravages
of time and age.
Although
there are a few exceptions, these themes tend to run through the other sonnets
as well. Millay’s musings on the nature of love, desire, sex, loss, grief,
pain, and endings are just amazing, really. I had not realized that these poems
existed, but this book is now one of my favorites.
Here
are a few that stood out - although I could have listed most of them here. This
one is from her first collection, Renascence, written in her late teens.
THOU art not lovelier
than lilacs,—no,
Nor honeysuckle; thou
art not more fair
Than small white
single poppies,—I can bear
Thy beauty; though I
bend before thee, though
From left to right,
not knowing where to go,
I turn my troubled
eyes, nor here nor there
Find any refuge from
thee, yet I swear
So has it been with
mist,—with moonlight so.
Like him who day by
day unto his draught
Of delicate poison
adds him one drop more
Till he may drink
unharmed the death of ten,
Even so, inured to
beauty, who have quaffed
Each hour more deeply
than the hour before,
I drink—and live—what
has destroyed some men.
This
illustrates one of her skills: taking a mushy love-sentiment, and somehow
turning it a wee bit poisonous. There is a sting in this and other poems. Like
this one.
Love, though for this
you riddle me with darts,
And drag me at your
chariot till I die,—
Oh, heavy prince! O,
panderer of hearts!—
Yet hear me tell how
in their throats they lie
Who shout you mighty:
thick about my hair,
Day in, day out, your
ominous arrows purr,
Who still am free, unto
no querulous care
A fool, and in no
temple worshiper!
I, that have bared me
to your quiver’s fire,
Lifted my face into
its puny rain,
Do wreathe you
Impotent to Evoke Desire
As you are Powerless
to Elicit Pain!
(Now will the god, for
blasphemy so brave,
Punish me, surely,
with the shaft I crave!)
A
bit of reverse psychology there, and yet so much angst.
This
next one is definitely a favorite. Having been raised in a subculture pounded
into us the ideas that Marriage is Miserable Hard Work™, Commitment™, Keep Your
Vows Even If Abused™ and the rest of the idolatry of marriage and family, I
have been drawn very much to the counter-idea: that a good relationship
shouldn’t feel like martyrdom, and that one should actually be happy to be
around one’s beloved.
OH, THINK not I am
faithful to a vow!
Faithless am I save to
love's self alone.
Were you not lovely I
would leave you now:
After the feet of
beauty fly my own.
Were you not still my
hunger's rarest food,
And water ever to my
wildest thirst,
I would desert
you–think not but I would!–
And seek another as I
sought you first.
But you are mobile as
the veering air,
And all your charms
more changeful than the tide,
Wherefore to be
inconstant is no care:
I have but to continue
at your side.
So wanton, light and
false, my love, are you,
I am most faithless
when I most am true.
Elizabeth
Barrett Browning also captured some of this in her sonnets (also favorites of mine - I’m a
hopeless romantic). Here is another one with delightful ambiguity about love:
Loving you less than
life, a little less
Than bitter-sweet upon
a broken wall
Or brush-wood smoke in
autumn, I confess
I cannot swear I love
you not at all.
For there is that
about you in this light—
A yellow darkness,
sinister of rain—
Which sturdily recalls
my stubborn sight
To dwell on you, and
dwell on you again.
And I am made aware of
many a week
I shall consume,
remembering in what way
Your brown hair grows
about your brow and cheek
And what divine
absurdities you say:
Till all the world,
and I, and surely you,
Will know I love you,
whether or not I do.
Less
lighthearted is this one:
Once more into my arid
days like dew,
Like wind from an
oasis, or the sound
Of cold sweet water
bubbling underground,
A treacherous
messenger, the thought of you
Comes to destroy me;
once more I renew
Firm faith in your
abundance, whom I found
Long since to be but
just one other mound
Of sand, whereon no
green thing ever grew.
And once again, and
wiser in no wise,
I chase your colored
phantom on the air,
And sob and curse and fall
and weep and rise
And stumble pitifully
on to where,
Miserable and lost,
with stinging eyes,
Once more I clasp,—and
there is nothing there.
Again,
just a brilliant picture. Bitter and yet full of desire.
This
next one is another favorite.
Let you not say of me
when I am old,
In pretty worship of
my withered hands
Forgetting who I am,
and how the sands
Of such a life as mine
run red and gold
Even to the ultimate
sifting dust, "Behold,
Here walketh
passionless age!"—for there expands
A curious superstition
in these lands,
And by its leave some
weightless tales are told.
In me no lenten wicks
watch out the night;
I am the booth where
Folly holds her fair;
Impious no less in
ruin than in strength,
When I lie crumbled to
the earth at length,
Let you not say,
"Upon this reverend site
The righteous groaned
and beat their breasts in prayer."
A
few layers to this one, to say the least. Millay challenges the idea that the
elderly are sexless, or extra-righteous, or merely to be reverenced. She is
still herself, passionate, impious, and the same as she ever was.
I
quote this next one because of an experience of my wife. This obnoxious racist
dickhead who was the parent of a kid (poor guy) who was in band with one of my
kids came up to her and said something nearly word for word as that said in
this poem. (Do I even need to add that this guy is a huge Trump fan? Or that he
was FINALLY banned from a local homeschool forum after repeated posts of
neo-confederate and other vile propaganda?)
Oh, oh, you will be
sorry for that word!
Give back my book and
take my kiss instead.
Was it my enemy or my
friend I heard,
“What a big book for
such a little head!”
Come, I will show you
now my newest hat,
And you may watch me
purse my mouth and prink!
Oh, I shall love you
still, and all of that.
I never again shall
tell you what I think.
I shall be sweet and
crafty, soft and sly;
You will not catch me
reading any more:
I shall be called a
wife to pattern by;
And some day when you
knock and push the door,
Some sane day, not too
bright and not too stormy,
I shall be gone, and
you may whistle for me.
Dude
was literally acting surprised my wife was reading a “big book.” He probably
has no idea about the stuff that she read while still a kid. After this incident,
when she withered him with a glare, we have taken to calling him “Tiny Books.”
Because his books are probably like the “hands” of his political idol. I am
also reminded of one of my favorite bits by James Thurber.
I
unfortunately cannot quote all of Fatal Interview, but highly recommend
it as a poem cycle. Here is the opening sonnet:
What thing is this
that, built of salt and lime
And such dry motes as
in the sunbeam show,
Has power upon me that
do daily climb
The dustless air?—for
whom those peaks of snow
Whereup the lungs of
man with borrowed breath
Go labouring to a doom
I may not feel,
Are but a pearled and
roseate plain beneath
My wingèd helmet and
my wingèd heel.
What sweet emotions
neither foe nor friend
Are these that clog my
flight? what thing is this
That hastening
headlong to a dusty end
Up, up, my
feathers!—ere I lay you by
To journey barefoot
with a mortal joy.
From
there, the cycle veers from the ecstacy of love to the depths of despair to the
resignation to the depredations of time. This one, from early in the series, is
as good of a love poem as I have read.
Not in a silver casket
cool with pearls
Or rich with red
corundum or with blue,
Locked, and the key
withheld, as other girls
Have given their
loves, I give my love to you;
Not in a lovers'-knot,
not in a ring
Worked in such
fashion, and the legend plain—
Semper fidelis, where
a secret spring
Kennels a drop of
mischief for the brain:
Love in the open hand,
no thing but that,
Ungemmed, unhidden,
wishing not to hurt,
As one should bring
you cowslips in a hat
Swung from the hand,
or apples in her skirt,
I bring you, calling
out as children do:
"Look what I
have!—And these are all for you."
It
just gets better every time I re-read it. And the form is perfect. The two
ideas in the two quatrains, followed by the turn in line nine, and the last
couplet so memorable and true.
A
later poem from the series take the theme carpe diem, but with the twist
that what youth doesn’t use, age will twist into something ugly. Unfortunately,
what came to mind with this one was the way that my parents’ generation has
mostly grown unwise with age, giving in to “compromise and fear,” selling their
souls to preserve a mythical past.
Heart, have no pity on
this house of bone:
Shake it with dancing,
break it down with joy.
No man holds mortgage
on it; it is your own;
To give, to sell at
auction, to destroy.
When you are blind to
moonlight on the bed,
When you are deaf to
gravel on the pane,
Shall quavering
caution from this house instead
Cluck forth at summer
mischief in the lane?
All that delightful
youth forbears to spend
Molestful age
inherits, and the ground
Will have us;
therefore, while we're young, my friend—
The Latin's vulgar, but
the advice is sound.
Youth, have no pity;
leave no farthing here
For age to invest in
compromise and fear.
This
next one is pretty dang dark. The relationship has begun to turn a bit, and the
combination of doubt, ennui, and suspicion creep around the corner.
Most wicked
words!-forbear to speak them out.
Utter them not again;
blaspheme no more
Against our love with
maxims learned from Doubt:
Lest Death should get
his foot inside the door.
We are surrounded by a
hundred foes;
And he that at your
bidding joins our feast,
I stake my heart upon
it, is one of those,
Nor in their councils
does he sit the least.
Hark not his whisper:
he is Time’s ally,
Kinsman to Death, and
leman of Despair:
Believe that I shall
love you till I die;
Believe; and thrust
him forth; and arm the stair;
And top the walls with
spikes and splintered glass
That he pass gutted
should again he pass.”
While
not the bulk of the poems, there are a few which are about altogether different
topics. One that I found particularly interesting is this one, written in honor
of suffragist Inez Milholland. Who also happened to be
Millay’s husband’s first wife - she died a few years prior to Millay’s
relationship with her husband.
Upon this marble bust
that is not I
Lay the round, formal
wreath that is not fame;
But in the forum of my
silenced cry
Root ye the living
tree whose sap is flame.
I, that was proud and
valiant, am no more; ---
Save as a dream that
wanders wide and late,
Save as a wind that
rattles the stout door,
Troubling the ashes in
the sheltered grate.
The stone will perish;
I shall be twice dust.
Only my standard on a
taken hill
Can cheat the mildew
and the red-brown rust
And make immortal my
adventurous will.
Even now the silk is
tugging at the staff:
Take up the song;
forget the epitaph.
That’s
a seriously great epitaph. Milholland would die before realizing the dream of
voting rights for women - a cause Millay also supported.
This
next poem is more about nature - both nature in the sense of the natural world,
but also in the sense of human nature. And not a very nice part of that second
nature either.
Enormous moon, that
rise behind these hills
Heavy and yellow in a
sky unstarred
And pale, your girth
by purple fillets barred
Of drifting cloud,
that as the cool sky fills
With planets and the
brighter stars, distills
To thinnest vapor and
floats valley-ward, —
You flood with
radiance all this cluttered yard,
The sagging fence, the
chipping window sills!
Grateful at
heart as if for my delight
You rose, I watch you
through a mist of tears,
Thinking how man, who
gags upon despair,
Salting his hunger
with the sweat of fright
Has fed on cold
indifference all these years,
Calling it kindness,
calling it God’s care.
Millay
was concerned about the modern American - or perhaps Western - tendency toward
social darwinism and of a “science” devoid of humanity or empathy. In our own
times, we are still continuing to pay for this soulless vision of technology
and raw capitalism. As Millay points out, we embrace data points without
context, without wisdom, without kindness. It is power for power’s sake.
Upon this age, that
never speaks its mind,
This furtive age, this
age endowed with power
To wake the moon with
footsteps, fit an oar
Into the rowlocks of
the wind, and find
What swims before his
prow, what swirls behind ---
Upon this gifted age,
in its dark hour,
Rains from the sky a
meteoric shower
Of facts . . . they
lie unquestioned, uncombined.
Wisdom enough to leech
us of our ill
Is daily spun; but
there exists no loom
To weave it into
fabric; undefiled
Proceeds pure Science,
and has her say; but still
Upon this world from
the collective womb
Is spewed all day the
red triumphant child.
It’s
a bit of a downer to end on, alas. Millay’s poems do seem to get darker over
time, and it is easy enough to see why. This poem was published in a collection
dated 1939, and there is no secret about the state of the world at that time.
Fascism threatened to envelope at least Europe, and possibly the world.
Although it would be anachronistic to read the horrors of nuclear war into this
poem, it fits all too well.
The
collection as a whole is more thoughtful than exuberant, more focused on time
and loss than on the ecstacy of love - although that is present as well. The
poems stand up so well, though, because of this emotionally realistic approach
to life and love. All is not well, and along with joy and love come loss and
pain.
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