Michelle Bitting: Pandemic Mask Sonnet
The world’s gone mad at the wheel
While bees and seas soar for bloom, germs and chaos
Straining against reorder.
Edna St. Vincent Millay: Afternoon on a Hill
I will look at cliffs and clouds
With quiet eyes,
Watch the wind bow down the grass,
And the grass rise.
Edna St. Vincent Millay: She had forgotten how the August Night
She had forgotten how the August night
Was level as a lake beneath the moon,
In which she swam a little, losing sight
Of shore
Edna St. Vincent Millay: I shall go back again to the bleak shore
I shall go back again to the bleak shore
And build a little shanty on the sand…
Edna St. Vincent Millay: “Parisian Dream” by Charles Baudelaire
And, proud of what my art had done,
I viewed my painting, knew the great
Intoxicating monotone
Of marble, water, steel and slate.
Edna St. Vincent Millay: The courage that my mother had
The courage that my mother had
Went with her, and is with her still:
Rock from New England quarried;
Now granite in a granite hill.
Edna St. Vincent Millay: I shall forget you presently, my dear (Sonnet IV)
I shall forget you presently, my dear,
So make the most of this, your little day
Edna St. Vincent Millay: Oh, sleep forever in the Latmian cave
Oh, sleep forever in the Latmian cave,
Mortal Endymion, darling of the Moon!
Charlotte Mew: A Quoi Bon Dire
Seventeen years ago you said
Something that sounded like Good-bye;
And everybody thinks that you are dead,
But I.
Edna St. Vincent Millay: Humoresque
“What queer books she must have read!”
Edna St. Vincent Millay: Dirge without Music
Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave
Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind…
Edna St. Vincent Millay: The Betrothal
And why should I be cold, my lad,
And why should you repine,
Because I love a dark head
That never will be mine?