Vox Populi
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Edna St. Vincent Millay: ‘She had a horror he would die at night’
She had a horror he would die at night.
And sometimes when the light began to fade
She could not keep from noticing how white
The birches looked and then she would be afraid,
Even with a lamp, to go about the house
And lock the windows; and as night wore on
Toward morning, if a dog howled, or a mouse
Squeaked in the floor, long after it was gone
Her flesh would sit awry on her. By day
She would forget somewhat, and it would seem
A silly thing to go with just this dream
And get a neighbor to come at night and stay.
But it would strike her sometimes, making tea:
She had kept that kettle boiling all night long, for company.
~~~~
Public Domain
Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892- 1950) was a poet and playwright, considered by many to be one of the greatest American poets of the twentieth century. Her poetry collections include The Harp-Weaver (Flying Cloud Press, 1923) and Renascence (Harper, 1917) .
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I love her work too. Refreshing palette cleanser these days. But also, a keen observer of life. She could do so much with a sonnet.
As an aside, her middle name: St. Vincent, was not in honor of the saint of that name, but Saint Vincent’s hospital in NYC, where a family member’s life was saved. My workplace, Saint Catherine University in St. Paul, was a favorite hideaway for Millay when she needed a quiet getaway. The feisty nuns amused her, so the story goes.
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Thanks, Jim. I didn’t know these facts about her life.
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If only keeping a boiling bubbling kettle through the darks could allay our fears right now. Edna who had a taste for dark comedia knew the white birches were tall skinny angels of what will/might come both in a day and at night…
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Absolutely yes!
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Each time you bring us a Millay sonnet I’ll reach out to her Collected Sonnets which is always on my writing desk (along with about 20 other books) and re-read a few more. Those books never leave my desk, never go find a place on my shelves in the room next door. I need those books to be there, at arm’s length, to console, inspire, reassure me. Millay is always there, with Merwin, Levis, Bolton, Kelly, Louis Aragon and other poets I must keep close. Tattered, indispensable companions…
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yes, right now, I have beside me new collections by Baron Wormser, Barbara Hamby and Jianqing Zhang. Words are popping.
M.
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She sings to me
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yes, I love her sonnets.
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I love Edna St. Vincent Millay’s work.
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Who—what is more fabulous than she? I love that she appears on this site, and you bring her to us every so often, reaching deep into poetry’s heart for her, where all of us must reach if we’re to do and be anything at all.
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Oh, Sean. Your comments here are so perfect. Thank you.
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