| Title | : | A Few Figs from Thistles |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 141791727X |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9781417917273 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 48 |
| Publication | : | First published January 1, 1920 |
A Few Figs from Thistles Reviews
-
What should I be but just what I am?
A Few Figs from Thistles, the second collection I read by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950) was the second collection of hers that was published (in 1920). As with the first collection I read by her,
Second April, I was mesmerized by her blending of the beauty of classic lyrical forms (sonnet, tercet, eulogy) with emotional self-expression in various moods and registers, swerving from feisty, vital and playful educing her freedom of mind to the more considerate, confessional stanza’s revealing heartbreak.
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!
Gracefully musical in her rhythms and rhyming, the melodious writing energizes. The poems testify of a passionate lust for life of a young woman who wasn’t to hang her head acquiescing to the coercion of the gender roles of her time, as the cheerful rebelliousness in Daphne and The philosopher illustrates:
THE PHILOSOPHER
AND what are you that, missing you,
I should be kept awake
As many nights as there are days
With weeping for your sake?
And what are you that, missing you,
As many days as crawl
I should be listening to the wind
And looking at the wall?
I know a man that's a braver man
And twenty men as kind,
And what are you, that you should be
The one man in my mind?
Yet women's ways are witless ways,
As any sage will tell,–
And what am I, that I should love
So wisely and so well?
There is exuberance, there is laughter. Flippant and scoffing, witty and at times a little naughty in a childlike way, the free-spirited woman is entitled to be as inconstant in love like men:
THURSDAY
AND if I loved you Wednesday,
Well, what is that to you?
I do not love you Thursday–
So much is true.
And why you come complaining
Is more than I can see.
I loved you Wednesday,–yes–but what
Is that to me?
(Does this poem remind you of a certain pop song too?)
Thank you so much, dear Vesna, for sending me this delightful breeze of refreshing lyricism on a wonderfully sunny spring Sunday.
The collection can be read
here. -
Having just read this volume back to back with Second April I’m struck by how established Millay’s voice already was as a young poet. These books, published in 1920 and 1921 before she was 30 contain some of her best known work, and the themes and voice that would mark her career were already clearly evident.
With her pithy opening poems First Fig and Second Fig Millay landed a powerful one two combo on the staid, Protestant ethic of her country. The rest of you may be dutiful ants, she seems to say, but look at what a glorious grasshopper I am! The Singing Woman from the Wood’s Edge elaborates on being a unique and wonderful oddity, and Portrait By A Neighbor gives the perspective of the stolid citizen looking at the activity of this strange woman who just refused to mind.
Yet it was The Unexplorer that captures my attention most on this read through, partially because I don’t remember ever reading it before, but mainly because it displayed Vincent’s humor and made me laugh:
There was a road ran past our house
Too lovely to explore.
I asked my mother once - she said
That if you follow where it led
It brought you to the milk-man’s door.
(That’s why I have not traveled more.) -
4.5
Millay's second collection of poetry, originally published in 1920 with 15 poems and then expanded with 8 more by the 1922 edition. She wrote them while living in the bohemian West Village. Almost all poems reflect a free-spirited young woman unwilling to play by society's gender rules.
I adore the music of her rhymes and rhythmic meters even though this fell out of fashion in the modernist poetry in favor of free verse forms. But, while faithful to the conventional poetic forms (which was a plus for me), in all other ways her poetry was modernist and, for a female poet, much ahead of her time. I am surprised she is not more revered today among feminists for her daring poetry of a liberated woman, breaking the barriers of gender conventions as she did in this splendid collection. She even challenged the centuries old mythological story of Daphne, turning it completely around with wit, whimsy, and a clever twist. It's one of my favorites in the collection.
My absolute favorites:
First Fig
Second Fig
Recuerdo
The Prisoner
Daphne
Portrait by a Neighbor
Grown-up
The Penitent
The Philosopher
Only the four sonnets as a group didn't work for me. While Millay brilliantly mastered the form, it felt stifled and forsaking the spontaneity of thought that is so magnificently accomplished in her other poems in this early collection. -
Thomas Hardy once said that America had two great attractions: the skyscraper and the poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay.
-
WHY do you follow me?–
Any moment I can be
Nothing but a laurel-tree.
Any moment of the chase
I can leave you in my place
A pink bough for your embrace.
Yet if over hill and hollow
Still it is your will to follow,
I am off;–to heel, Apollo!
Thank you to Ilse for the link. A nice little collection. -
Charming
"Her lawn looks like a meadow, and if she mows the place, she leaves the clover standing, and the Queen Anne's lace"!
Beautiful, flighty poems, that give one a strong impression of undressed honesty. -
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!
SECOND FIG
SAFE upon the solid rock the ugly houses stand:
Come and see my shining palace built upon the sand!
[Page 10]
RECUERDO
WE were very tired, we were very merry–
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
It was bare and bright, and smelled like a stable–
But we looked into a fire, we leaned across a table,
We lay on a hill-top underneath the moon;
And the whistles kept blowing, and the dawn came soon.
We were very tired, we were very merry–
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry;
And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear,
From a dozen of each we had bought somewhere;
And the sky went wan, and the wind came cold,
And the sun rose dripping, a bucketful of gold.
We were very tired, we were very merry,
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
We hailed, "Good morrow, mother!" to a shawl-covered head,
[Page 11]
And bought a morning paper, which neither of us read;
And she wept, "God bless you!" for the apples and pears,
And we gave her all our money but our subway fares.
[Page 12]
THURSDAY
AND if I loved you Wednesday,
Well, what is that to you?
I do not love you Thursday–
So much is true.
And why you come complaining
Is more than I can see.
I loved you Wednesday,–yes–but what
Is that to me?
[Page 13]
TO THE NOT IMPOSSIBLE HIM
HOW shall I know, unless I go
To Cairo and Cathay,
Whether or not this blessed spot
Is blest in every way?
Now it may be, the flower for me
Is this beneath my nose;
How shall I tell, unless I smell
The Carthaginian rose?
The fabric of my faithful love
No power shall dim or ravel
Whilst I stay here,–but oh, my dear
If I should ever travel!
[Page 14]
MACDOUGAL STREET
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?)
[Page 15]
But he caught the quaint Italian quip she flung him from the gutter;
(What can there be to cry about that I should lie and cry?)
He laid his darling hand upon her little black head,
(I wish I were a ragged child with ear-rings in my ears! )
And he said she was a baggage to have said what she had said;
(Truly I shall be ill unless I stop these tears!)
[Page 16]
THE SINGING-WOMAN FROM THE WOOD'S EDGE
WHAT should I be but a prophet and a liar,
Whose mother was a leprechaun, whose father was a friar?
Teethed on a crucifix and cradled under water,
What should I be but the fiend's god-daughter?
And who should be my playmates but the adder and the frog,
That was got beneath a furze-bush and born in a bog?
And what should be my singing, that was christened at an altar,
But Aves and Credos and Psalms out of the Psalter?
You will see such webs on the wet grass, maybe,
As a pixie-mother weaves for her baby,
You will find such flame at the wave's weedy ebb
As flashes in the meshes of a mer-mother's web,
[Page 17]
But there comes to birth no common spawn
From the love of a priest for a leprechaun,
And you never have seen and you never will see
Such things as the things that swaddled me!
After all's said and after all's done,
What should I be but a harlot and a nun?
In through the bushes, on any foggy day,
My Da would come a-swishing of the drops away,
With a prayer for my death and a groan for my birth,
A-mumbling of his beads for all that he was worth.
And there sit my Ma, her knees beneath her chin,
A-looking in his face and a-drinking of it in,
And a-marking in the moss some funny little saying
That would mean just the opposite of all that he was praying!
He taught me the holy-talk of Vesper and of Matin,
He heard me my Greek and he heard me my Latin,
He blessed me and crossed me to keep my soul from evil,
And we watched him out of sight, and we conjured up the devil!
[Page 18]
Oh, the things I haven't seen and the things I haven't known,
What with hedges and ditches till after I was grown,
And yanked both ways by my mother and my father,
With a "Which would you better?" and a "Which would you rather?"
With him for a sire and her for a dam,
What should I be but just what I am?
[Page 19]
SHE IS OVERHEARD SINGING
OH, Prue she has a patient man,
And Joan a gentle lover,
And Agatha's Arth' is a hug-the-hearth,–
But my true love's a rover!
Mig, her man's as good as cheese
And honest as a briar,
Sue tells her love what he's thinking of,–
But my dear lad's a liar!
Oh, Sue and Prue and Agatha
Are thick with Mig and Joan!
They bite their threads and shake their heads
And gnaw my name like a bone;
And Prue says, "Mine's a patient man,
As never snaps me up,"
[Page 20]
And Agatha, "Arth' is a hug-the-hearth,
Could live content in a cup,"
Sue's man's mind is like good jell–
All one color, and clear–
And Mig's no call to think at all
What's to come next year,
While Joan makes boast of a gentle lad,
That's troubled with that and this;–
But they all would give the life they live
For a look from the man I kiss!
Cold he slants his eyes about,
And few enough's his choice,–
Though he'd slip me clean for a nun, or a queen,
Or a beggar with knots in her voice,–
And Agatha will turn awake
While her good man sleeps sound,
And Mig and Sue and Joan and Prue
Will hear the clock strike round,
For Prue she has a patient man,
As asks not when or why,
[Page 21]
And Mig and Sue have naught to do
But peep who's passing by,
Joan is paired with a putterer
That bastes and tastes and salts,
And Agatha's Arth' is a hug-the-hearth,–
But my true love is false!
[Page 22]
THE PRISONER
ALL right,
Go ahead!
What's in a name?
I guess I'll be locked into
As much as I'm locked out of!
[Page 23]
THE UNEXPLORER
THERE was a road ran past our house
Too lovely to explore.
I asked my mother once–she said
That if you followed where it led
It brought you to the milk-man's door.
(That's why I have not traveled more.)
[Page 24]
GROWN-UP
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?
[Page 25]
THE PENITENT
I HAD a little Sorrow,
Born of a little Sin,
I found a room all damp with gloom
And shut us all within;
And, "Little Sorrow, weep," said I,
"And, Little Sin, pray God to die,
And I upon the floor will lie
And think how bad I've been!"
Alas for pious planning–
It mattered not a whit!
As far as gloom went in that room,
The lamp might have been lit!
My little Sorrow would not weep,
My little Sin would go to sleep–
To save my soul I could not keep
My graceless mind on it!
So up I got in anger,
And took a book I had,
[Page 26]
And put a ribbon on my hair
To please a passing lad.
And, "One thing there's no getting by–
I've been a wicked girl," said I;
"But if I can't be sorry, why,
I might as well be glad!"
[Page 27]
DAPHNE
WHY do you follow me?–
Any moment I can be
Nothing but a laurel-tree.
Any moment of the chase
I can leave you in my place
A pink bough for your embrace.
Yet if over hill and hollow
Still it is your will to follow,
I am off;–to heel, Apollo!
[Page 28]
PORTRAIT BY A NEIGHBOR
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,
[Page 29]
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!
[Page 30]
MIDNIGHT OIL
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!
[Page 31]
THE MERRY MAID
OH, I am grown so free from care
Since my heart broke!
I set my throat against the air,
I laugh at simple folk!
There's little kind and little fair
Is worth its weight in smoke
To me, that's grown so free from care
Since my heart broke!
Lass, if to sleep you would repair
As peaceful as you woke,
Best not besiege your lover there
For just the words he spoke
To me, that's grown so free from care
Since my heart broke!
[Page 32]
TO KATHLEEN
STILL must the poet as of old,
In barren attic bleak and cold,
Starve, freeze, and fashion verses to
Such things as flowers and song and you;
Still as of old his being give
In Beauty's name, while she may live,
Beauty that may not die as long
As there are flowers and you and song.
[Page 33]
TO S. M.
If he should lie a-dying
I AM not willing you should go
Into the earth, where Helen went;
She is awake by now, I know.
Where Cleopatra's anklets rust
You will not lie with my consent;
And Sappho is a roving dust;
Cressid could love again; Dido,
Rotted in state, is restless still;
You leave me much against my will.
[Page 34]
THE PHILOSOPHER
AND what are you that, missing you,
I should be kept awake
As many nights as there are days
With weeping for your sake?
And what are you that, missing you,
As many days as crawl
I should be listening to the wind
And looking at the wall?
I know a man that's a braver man
And twenty men as kind,
And what are you, that you should be
The one man in my mind?
Yet women's ways are witless ways,
As any sage will tell,–
And what am I, that I should love
So wisely and so well?
[Page 35]
FOUR SONNETS
[Page 36]
I
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!)
[Page 37]
II
I THINK I should have loved you presently,
And given in earnest words I flung in jest;
And lifted honest eyes for you to see,
And caught your hand against my cheek and breast;
And all my pretty follies flung aside
That won you to me, and beneath your gaze,
Naked of reticence and shorn of pride,
Spread like a chart my little wicked ways.
I, that had been to you, had you remained,
But one more waking from a recurrent dream,
Cherish no less the certain stakes I gained,
And walk your memory's halls, austere, supreme,
A ghost in marble of a girl you knew
Who would have loved you in a day or two.
[Page 38]
III
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.
[Page 39]
IV
I SHALL forget you presently, my dear,
So make the most of this, your little day,
Your little month, your little half a year,
Ere I forget, or die, or move away,
And we are done forever; by and by
I shall forget you, as I said, but now,
If you entreat me with your loveliest lie
I will protest you with my favorite vow.
I would indeed that love were longer-lived,
And vows were not so brittle as they are,
But so it is, and nature has contrived
To struggle on without a break thus far,–
Whether or not we find what we are seeking
Is idle, biologically speaking.
Source:
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/millay/figs/figs.html -
RECUERDO
We were very tired, we were very merry--
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
It was bare and bright, and smelled like a stable--
But we looked into a fire, we leaned across a table,
We lay on the hill-top underneath the moon;
And the whistles kept blowing, and the dawn came
soon.
We were very tired, we were very merry--
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry;
And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear,
From a dozen of each we had bought somewhere;
And the sky went wan, and the wind came cold,
And the sun rose dripping, a bucketful of gold.
We were very tired, we were very merry,
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
We hailed, "Good morrow, mother!" to a shawl-
covered head,
And bought a morning paper, which neither of us
read;
And she wept, "God bless you!" for the apples and
the pears,
And we gave her all our money but our subway
fares.
(Found a hardback of this from 1922 at Black Dog Books in Zionsville, Indiana, when I was there visiting family. It had no dust jacket, but otherwise was in good shape. A sweet, slim volume. Oh, and I got to meet the eponymous black dog, who was also very sweet: an English lab named Sophie.) -
The Philosopher
And what are you that, wanting you
I should be kept awake
As many nights as there are days
With weeping for your sake?
And what are you that, missing you,
As many days as crawl
I should be listening to the wind
And looking at the wall?
I know a man that's a braver man
And twenty men as kind,
And what are you, that you should be
The one man in my mind?
Yet women's ways are witless ways,
As any sage will tell,--
And what am I, that I should love
So wisely and so well? -
[4.5] Feminist poetry from the USA in 1920: was expecting a lot of verse about the vote, I think.
I read, at first puzzled as to how this was feminist because it seemed so 'normal' - but that was the very thing. It's not ideological preaching: this attitude of taken-for-granted independence was remarkable then. Assertive female Classical subjects like her Daphne running from Apollo weren't a staple as they have become (Carol Ann Duffy, U.A. Fanthorpe). And whilst loving both men and women, and elegant references to non-monogamy are something I'd be accustomed to read of now - and the Bloomsbury group may have been living similar lives to Millay's - it was bold to publish about it then. She has no compunction at mentioning she cried about a male lover or in including trivial and funny verses too: allowing herself freer thinking than many feminist writers of the later twentieth century.
The over-obvious rhymes sometimes found Renascence and Other Poems, are almost gone in this second collection.
Here is laughter and heartbreak and archness all in one tiny collection. If I started a list of favourites it may include nearly half the table of contents.
I very much want a Collected Works now but that will just have to wait as I am trying not to buy any books in June and maybe even longer (unless there were some exceptionally good reason - wanting one a lot whilst being up to reading many other things I have around me does not count). Goodreads does implicitly encourage reading more books rather than mooching about looking at pages of the already-read, something I used to do much more.
Minor flaw in this free Kindle edition: the titles are not in bold or any sort of heading format. -
Playful & precise. Favorites: to the not impossible him; the singing-woman from the woods edge; grown-up; portrait by a neighbor; to Kathleen; the philosopher; all 4 sonnets
Grown-Up
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?
From sonnet 3:
“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.” -
While the style of the poetry is close to what I enjoy, I didn't love what she was saying in any of the poems I read. Poetry about how she loves her husband, but only because she doesn't have any better options is not really my thing.
-
rereading it all week
-
I’ve been trying to read more classic poetry instead of just writing it or reading modern less-like literature poetry. I read a poem by Millay for my class and decided to check this out from the library because I like what I read.
This was thoroughly enjoyable! If you like reading poems that deal with love then this is definitely for you.
You can see the character, I’m guessing being Millay herself or whoever the narrator is, progress throughout these poems. She is describing love as something that is completely unnecessary for life. But not in the way that it’s a burden and she doesn’t want any part of it. But in the way that she doesn’t want it to get in the way of life. She’s saying life is short and the years are already stripping away from you enjoying it’s pleasures, so why let some man strip more away? Another thing is: she’s not necessarily void of romance but more like trying to work towards it having less of an influence in her life.
“Why do you deserve to be the only thing on my mind and how did this happen”
Many of the poems in the beginning half are written with this outlook. As if the narrator is not allowing herself to fall in love due to it spoiling the pleasures of life. However as we go further and things seem slightly different. There become some poems where she analyzes her past decisions and wonders if she should allow herself to become more absorbed in her love life.
There’s progression in the character, which is really interesting considering it’s a bunch of poems/sonnets? We see the narrator come to terms with herself and the fact that it’s okay to love and while yes, you shouldn’t let it completey absorb you, you should still allow good things to happen.
Some heartbreaking quotes:
“I think I should have loved you presently” in a sonnet
Then in a following sonnet:
“I shall forget you presently, my dear”
Also:
“A ghost in marble of a girl you knew who would have loved you in a day or two” -
Even when I wasn’t a fan of poetry I was a fan of Edna St. Vincent Millay. She suits a very particular taste. Her poetry is sometimes jagged, it doesn’t flow off the tongue, but it’s still beautiful in its cacophony if syllables. It’s always very honest too, sometimes brutally so. She never wrapped up her meaning in pretentious wanderings, and I think that she was very often calling out to other women. She paints such vivid imagery; she is great for a smile. Sometimes she makes you see the beauty in nature, and sometimes she evokes the beauty of sadness, either way if you enjoy her poetry you’ll want to hug the book to your chest at the end of each sonnet.
-
"We were very tired, we were very merry−−
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry;
And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear,
From a dozen of each we had bought somewhere;
And the sky went wan, and the wind came cold,
And the sun rose dripping, a bucketful of gold."
সুন্দর এবং সুখপাঠ্য লেখা ; Millay'র লেখা প্রথমবার পড়লাম; সম্ভবত এঁর বাকি লেখাগুলাও পড়ে ফেলতে হবে। ছন্দের চমৎকার খেলা জানে! (যদিও ছন্দ আমি ভাল বুঝি না পড়তে ভাল লাগছে; ছড়া পড়ার মত আনন্দ আছে :3 ) -
A lovely book of poems. I managed to find a hardcover 1922 printing which is also wonderful. One of my favorite verses from "The Penitent":
So up I got in anger
And took a book I had,
And put a ribbon in my hair
To please a passing lad.
And, "one thing there's no getting by-
I've been a wicked girl," said I;
"But if I can't be sorry, why,
I might as well be glad!" -
I was lucky to have heard a voice recording of Edna reading these out loud years ago so whenever I re read them I can hear her in my head which is wonderful.
I don't read an awful lot of poetry and I don't really know why because when I do I love it so much.
Her style is eloquent, joyful, mischievous, and just completely delightful. This collection contains some of my favorites. -
At times hilarious, at others shocking, this is a wonderful little collection of poetry that is oddly touching.
Sneaky lady Millay, sneaky.
Crossposted at Booklikes. -
2016 update: When my brain is in the mood for verse, nothing but verse will do.
-
Delightful, heart-wrenching, occasionally humorous, quick. Highly recommend for a rainy afternoon, if you want to savor.
-
I ordered a hold on this collection at the Georgetown Library after reading Maria Popova's review on Brain Pickings (
https://www.brainpickings.org/2017/09...).
I agree with Popova, but my favoriate poem of the lot had less to do with love and more to do with a half fairy tale:
THE SINGING-WOMAN FROM THE WOOD'S EDGE
WHAT should I be but a prophet and a liar,
Whose mother was a leprechaun, whose father was a friar?
Teethed on a crucifix and cradled under water,
What should I be but the fiend's god-daughter?
And who should be my playmates but the adder and the frog,
That was got beneath a furze-bush and born in a bog?
And what should be my singing, that was christened at an altar,
But Aves and Credos and Psalms out of the Psalter?
You will see such webs on the wet grass, maybe,
As a pixie-mother weaves for her baby,
You will find such flame at the wave's weedy ebb
As flashes in the meshes of a mer-mother's web,
But there comes to birth no common spawn
From the love of a priest for a leprechaun,
And you never have seen and you never will see
Such things as the things that swaddled me!
After all's said and after all's done,
What should I be but a harlot and a nun?
In through the bushes, on any foggy day,
My Da would come a-swishing of the drops away,
With a prayer for my death and a groan for my birth,
A-mumbling of his beads for all that he was worth.
And there sit my Ma, her knees beneath her chin,
A-looking in his face and a-drinking of it in,
And a-marking in the moss some funny little saying
That would mean just the opposite of all that he was praying!
He taught me the holy-talk of Vesper and of Matin,
He heard me my Greek and he heard me my Latin,
He blessed me and crossed me to keep my soul from evil,
And we watched him out of sight, and we conjured up the devil!
Oh, the things I haven't seen and the things I haven't known,
What with hedges and ditches till after I was grown,
And yanked both ways by my mother and my father,
With a "Which would you better?" and a "Which would you rather?"
With him for a sire and her for a dam,
What should I be but just what I am? -
The audiobook version of these 23 saucy and insouciant little poems, read by Kristen Hughes, is very well done. Her crisp, dry tone and light inflection works well for these early 20th-century words, written by a cosmopolitan American woman; living, loving, and leaving broken hearts behind her from New York City to Paris. To read the printed versions, I enjoyed the longer sonnets, but the audio recordings of 'Recuerdo', 'The Penitent', and 'The Philosopher' were delightful to my ears and tickled my heart.
Here's one of her four sonnets:
I SHALL forget you presently, my dear,
So make the most of this, your little day,
Your little month, your little half a year,
Ere I forget, or die, or move away,
And we are done forever; by and by
I shall forget you, as I said, but now,
If you entreat me with your loveliest lie
I will protest you with my favourite vow.
I would indeed that love were longer-lived,
And oaths were not so brittle as they are,
But so it is, and nature has contrived
To struggle on without a break thus far, --
Whether or not we find what we are seeking
Is idle, biologically speaking. -
A freebie from Amazon for Kindle!
What does the title mean? It's often translated as a allusion to figs as a symbol for women writing in the then primarily male-centric field of poetry: a plump, piquant fig amidst the thistle, which is a bristling, prickly, ill-tempered weed.
About the author--Edna St. Vincent Millay was an American lyrical poet and playwright. She received the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1923, the third woman to win the award for poetry, and was also known for her feminist activism and her many love affairs. She used the pseudonym Nancy Boyd for her prose work.
Everyone knows the first fig! "My candle burns at both ends.." A great poem for the roaring '20s! Not so much for the 2020s.
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This slim book is Millay’s second collection of poems. It has two sections; the first contains 19 brief poems, the second four thematically-related sonnets. The unity of theme extends to the poem in the first section as well. Taken together, they depict the persona of a young woman confident of her power to attract and abashed in her determination to sample life to the full. At the same time, the much-quoted four-liner that opens the collection—the first “fig”—makes clear that she is aware that such a life comes only with a cost.
In their own way, these poems are as impressive as those in her first collection, Renascence, although generally more playful and assertive. They brightened a train ride on a cold, gray day. -
Beautiful and brief collection of little poems, which oddly felt very personal to me at time of reading. So much of these little sonnets, little scraps of poetry (some were very short, only about 4-6 lines) tackle the idea of wanting and being wanted, which is something that has occupied much of my mind recently. Her language is bright and crisp, and the images she produces are vivid-- truly showing a master of language and lyric, when your poems are short but so undeniably vibrant. I have missed reading poetry, and this book (despite its length) has solidified that for me.
