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spenkevich's review against another edition
5.0
More like Edna St. Vincent can SLAY am I right!?
But for real, this pioneering and queer icon of American poetry delivers a paragon of prose across a sublimity of stanzas. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize—being not only the first woman to ever receive it but the second person ever—for her poem The Ballad of the Harp Weaver (read it HERE) and Frost Medal for a lifetime achievement in poetry, Edna St. Vincent Millay was well regarded in her own time for her art as much as she was a well-known social figure and feminist activist. Not only a writer of great poems, she was also commissioned to write the opera The Kings Henchman and published three plays in verse. One of which, [b:The Lamp and the Bell|753867|The Lamp and the Bell|Edna St. Vincent Millay|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1178056952l/753867._SY75_.jpg|739986], was an openly and boldly sapphic work published in 1921. A masterful writer who’s works still endure and endear today.
Sonnet XV
Only until this cigarette is ended,
A little moment at the end of all,
While on the floor the quiet ashes fall,
And in the firelight to a lance extended,
Bizarrely with the jazzing music blended,
The broken shadow dances on the wall,
I will permit my memory to recall
The vision of you, by all my dreams attended.
And then adieu, — farewell! — the dream is done.
Yours is a face of which I can forget
The colour and the features, every one,
The words not ever, and the smiles not yet;
But in your day this moment is the sun
Upon a hill, after the sun has set.
I must confess every year when Spring comes around I think of her lines ‘To what purpose, April, do you return again? / Beauty is not enough.’ She had an incredible knack for wonderful turns of phrase, both in poetry and in social life with zingers like ‘I love humanity but I hate people.’ Even though she was largely awarded and praised, such as critic Harriet Monroe having called her ‘the greatest woman poet since Sappho’ her reputation is often more discussed than her art. A well-known socialite who frequented parties, Edna was a hot scandalous topic in her day for being openly bisexual, an ardent feminist, and having a period of morphine addiction. As a person with a large public persona, she would use it to bring her poetry to the world. After marrying Eugen Boissevain in 1923, he set aside his career and focused on hers, becoming her “manager” of sorts and organizing many public appearances and readings which would lead to her enduring fame. Her work lives on today, particularly her sonnets such as this, ‘>What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why’ largely considered her most well known work:
What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,
I have forgotten, and what arms have lain
Under my head till morning; but the rain
Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh
Upon the glass and listen for reply,
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.
Thus in the winter stands the lonely tree,
Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,
Yet knows its boughs more silent than before:
I cannot say what loves have come and gone,
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.
Time is the omnipresent theme across her works, the way the days forever push forward as dust and decay overtakes even the most beautiful aspects of the present. In this way flowers are a frequent metaphor, the dropping of pedals marking the hours and days as time ebbs away from us all. Yet even while acknowledging this truth of time and death, her works are a rebellion against it as well:
‘I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.
So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:
Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned
With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.’
Even looking death in the face she gives us nothing but beauty and we see how lasting prose is a form of immortality in a world where everything must one day vanish:
‘when you, that at this moment are to me
dearer than words on paper, shall depart,
and be no more the warder of my heart,
whereof again myself shall hold the key;
and be no more-what now you seem to be-
the sun, from which all excellences start
in a round nimbus, nor a broken dart
of moonlight, even, splintered on the sea;
i shall remember only of this hour-
and weep somewhat, as now you see me weep-
the pathos of your love, that, like a flower,
fearful of death yet amorous of sleep,
droops for a moment and beholds, dismayed,
the wind whereon its petals shall be laid.’
Grief and loss also nestle themselves into many of her works, riding shotgun with the passage of time to bring grief but also see if fade with the hours as well. She points our attention to how the world is a beautiful place full of wondrous moments, but it is often the tragedy that we only realize the gifts and glory of life in hindsight. In this way memory looms large over these works and through her poems we too, remember her.
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.
The poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay is as fantastic as she is fascinating as an icon. One detail about her legacy I’ve always loved is that poet [a:Mary Oliver|23988|Mary Oliver|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1634180145p2/23988.jpg] worked in her estate, which was where she would meet her partner Molly Malone Cook. It was a passing of both the sapphic and poetic torch and I love that. I also love these poems and hope you do too.
5/5
First Fig
My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light!
But for real, this pioneering and queer icon of American poetry delivers a paragon of prose across a sublimity of stanzas. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize—being not only the first woman to ever receive it but the second person ever—for her poem The Ballad of the Harp Weaver (read it HERE) and Frost Medal for a lifetime achievement in poetry, Edna St. Vincent Millay was well regarded in her own time for her art as much as she was a well-known social figure and feminist activist. Not only a writer of great poems, she was also commissioned to write the opera The Kings Henchman and published three plays in verse. One of which, [b:The Lamp and the Bell|753867|The Lamp and the Bell|Edna St. Vincent Millay|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1178056952l/753867._SY75_.jpg|739986], was an openly and boldly sapphic work published in 1921. A masterful writer who’s works still endure and endear today.
Sonnet XV
Only until this cigarette is ended,
A little moment at the end of all,
While on the floor the quiet ashes fall,
And in the firelight to a lance extended,
Bizarrely with the jazzing music blended,
The broken shadow dances on the wall,
I will permit my memory to recall
The vision of you, by all my dreams attended.
And then adieu, — farewell! — the dream is done.
Yours is a face of which I can forget
The colour and the features, every one,
The words not ever, and the smiles not yet;
But in your day this moment is the sun
Upon a hill, after the sun has set.
I must confess every year when Spring comes around I think of her lines ‘To what purpose, April, do you return again? / Beauty is not enough.’ She had an incredible knack for wonderful turns of phrase, both in poetry and in social life with zingers like ‘I love humanity but I hate people.’ Even though she was largely awarded and praised, such as critic Harriet Monroe having called her ‘the greatest woman poet since Sappho’ her reputation is often more discussed than her art. A well-known socialite who frequented parties, Edna was a hot scandalous topic in her day for being openly bisexual, an ardent feminist, and having a period of morphine addiction. As a person with a large public persona, she would use it to bring her poetry to the world. After marrying Eugen Boissevain in 1923, he set aside his career and focused on hers, becoming her “manager” of sorts and organizing many public appearances and readings which would lead to her enduring fame. Her work lives on today, particularly her sonnets such as this, ‘>What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why’ largely considered her most well known work:
What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,
I have forgotten, and what arms have lain
Under my head till morning; but the rain
Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh
Upon the glass and listen for reply,
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.
Thus in the winter stands the lonely tree,
Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,
Yet knows its boughs more silent than before:
I cannot say what loves have come and gone,
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.
Time is the omnipresent theme across her works, the way the days forever push forward as dust and decay overtakes even the most beautiful aspects of the present. In this way flowers are a frequent metaphor, the dropping of pedals marking the hours and days as time ebbs away from us all. Yet even while acknowledging this truth of time and death, her works are a rebellion against it as well:
‘I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.
So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:
Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned
With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.’
Even looking death in the face she gives us nothing but beauty and we see how lasting prose is a form of immortality in a world where everything must one day vanish:
‘when you, that at this moment are to me
dearer than words on paper, shall depart,
and be no more the warder of my heart,
whereof again myself shall hold the key;
and be no more-what now you seem to be-
the sun, from which all excellences start
in a round nimbus, nor a broken dart
of moonlight, even, splintered on the sea;
i shall remember only of this hour-
and weep somewhat, as now you see me weep-
the pathos of your love, that, like a flower,
fearful of death yet amorous of sleep,
droops for a moment and beholds, dismayed,
the wind whereon its petals shall be laid.’
Grief and loss also nestle themselves into many of her works, riding shotgun with the passage of time to bring grief but also see if fade with the hours as well. She points our attention to how the world is a beautiful place full of wondrous moments, but it is often the tragedy that we only realize the gifts and glory of life in hindsight. In this way memory looms large over these works and through her poems we too, remember her.
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.
The poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay is as fantastic as she is fascinating as an icon. One detail about her legacy I’ve always loved is that poet [a:Mary Oliver|23988|Mary Oliver|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1634180145p2/23988.jpg] worked in her estate, which was where she would meet her partner Molly Malone Cook. It was a passing of both the sapphic and poetic torch and I love that. I also love these poems and hope you do too.
5/5
First Fig
My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light!
blairmahoney's review against another edition
3.0
A few highlights, but this selection concentrates on her early works, which I find less impressive than her later poetry.
toffishay's review against another edition
emotional
funny
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
I loved reading these poems. They're so beautiful, full of life and personality. I won't waste time lamenting that I didn't know about Edna St. Vincent Millay before and I'll just be happy that I know about her now. :)
Content Warnings
Minor: Death
krobart's review against another edition
3.0
See my review here:
http://whatmeread.wordpress.com/2014/08/29/day-573-the-selected-poetry-of-edna-st-vincent-millay/
http://whatmeread.wordpress.com/2014/08/29/day-573-the-selected-poetry-of-edna-st-vincent-millay/
reba_reads_books's review against another edition
4.0
I wanted to read a library copy of her work before I delved into a first edition of hers that was gifted to me by someone dear. Some of these poems didn't do much for me, but a great deal of them blew my mind. A lot of them I re-read over and over, in awe at her talent for transporting me into imagery and emotion. Some made me sorrowful, at how truly she understood and articulated grief. Some made me squeal and laugh, to think of a feminist of her time being so upfront, so brazen about relationships and desire. Tbh I would totally send "Thursday" to some fuckbois I know. Bravo, Edna.