Edna St. Vincent Millay has created complex as well as emotionally and politically charged poetry in her career. Her poetry is often considered expressive yet also indifferent by some critics. Yet, her skill with metaphor and other evocative poetic features bring us poems that are reflective of her self, and also ourselves as readers. By developing skilled metaphors for interpreting and developing her own identity as an author and for us as a reader, we are given a construction of selfhood. In this
Edna St. Vincent Millay's "What Lips My Lips Have Kissed, and Where and Why" is an effective short poem, which feeds on the dissonance between the ideal of love and its reality, heartbreak. In William Shakespeare's "Let Me Not to The Marriage of True Minds," the effectiveness is weakened by its idealiality and metaphysical stereotype. In contrast to Millay, Shakespeare paints a genuine portrait of what love should be but unfortunately never really is. This factor is what makes his poem difficult
"What lips my lips have kissed" by Edna St. Vincent Millay While reading "What lips my lips have kissed" by Edna St. Vincent Millay, I realized many things about myself. The first thing was that I, after thinking I would never be able to decipher one word of poetry, actually could. I also found that I was able to enjoy it. Another thing was that the narrator (whom I felt was a woman- no man could portray these feelings like a woman) and I had strikingly similar feelings. There happened to be many
The main theme of the two poems is love. However, their prospective on the topic differs just slightly. In “Love is Not All” by Edna St. Vincent Millay tells how love will not cure a sickness or injury, but in some way it is still a necessity in life. Whereas in “Since feeling is First” by E. E. Cummings describes how love is more important than logic in the end and how you should not worry about what you are getting out of love because it is essential for a well-balanced life. The main theme in
Normal Covers a Wide Range: The Poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay The poet Edna St. Vincent Millay is a composite of her own unique history: she thinks about it, reflects upon it, and recognizes how things happen in life and why. As a result, her poetry has a cause and effect quality, as though shaped by the people, events, and relationships influential to her thinking and behavior. However, Sigmund Freud says that the drives and impulses behind behavioral forces are internal. [comment1]He
about with us." - Oscar Wilde. In her poem, "Recuerdo" Edna St. Vincent Millay tells of a night worth remembering, as she gives purpose and significance to the tiny moments. Edna St. Vincent Millay uses repetition, common themes, and imagery to recount an innocent memory through the eyes of a young girl in love. Edna St. Vincent Millay repeats the first two lines of her poem, “Recuerdo” in an effort to cling to the memory. Millay stresses the emotions felt by repeating, “we were very tired,we were
distressed and Gilman's The Yellow Wallpaper Two Works Cited In the early nineteenth century, the issue of whether women should be granted certain privileges, such as voting, arose in America. Two female writers during this time are Edna St. Vincent Millay and Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Both women were living in a period of history where women's writings created an impact on literature. Most women were supposed to stay at home and take care of the children and many women were not highly educated;
me but in the sestet she is saying forget about me, this is what is meant by change of meaning in the octave and sestet. The second sonnet I shall be looking is called "Sonnet" which is written after 1914. This sonnet is written by Edna St. Vincent Millay. "Sonnet" is about past love and not having anyone too love. In the octave she talks about the past but in the sestet she talks about the present. This is another demonstration of how the meaning has changed in the octave and sestet. The
possibilities that are new and unfamiliar for the traveler. The poem Travel written by Edna St. Vincent Millay does a great job of using its metaphors to deliver this message The process of the unknown journey is often started with the dream and wonders. It allows fantasy about places one has never been before. The poem, Travel states “The railroad track is miles away, /And the day is loud with voices speaking,” (Millay). This is
Life's Simple Pleasures in William Wordsworth's I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud Edna St. Vincent Millay once wrote, "And all the loveliest things there be come simply, so it seems to me." This aphorism clearly accents the meaning of William Wordsworth's poem "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud." In his work, the speaker reminisces about a past experience in which he saw a beautiful multitude of daffodils swaying in the breeze. As he recollects this scene, the speaker gradually realizes the true beauty
An Analysis of Millay's Poem, Renascence At first glance Edna St. Vincent Millay's first recognized poem, Renascence, seems to be easy to understand and follow. However, as this sing-songy poem is dissected, the reader embarks upon a world full of emotion, religion, confusion, pain and sin. This poem is split up into six sections or stanzas which separate the action of the poem into easy to understand parts. I have chosen to discuss the first section of the poem for my close reading. Although
Edna St. Vincent Millay once stated, “I am glad that I paid so little attention to good advice; had I abided by it I might have been saved from some of my most valuable mistakes.” Millay was a poet in the early 1900s. She wrote numerous poems in which all a constant theme. Two of my favorite poems from her are Spring, which was written in 1921, and I Forgot for a Moment which was published in 1940. These two poems were written nineteen years apart, but Millay showed a thematic connection between
1967 book, Edna St. Vincent Millay, James Gray writes that "the theme of all her [Millay's] poetry is the search for the integrity of the individual spirit" (Gray 6). While searching for the uniqueness of the individual spirit, Millay's poetry, especially "Sonnet xxxi", becomes interested in how the individual works when it is involoved in a relationship and must content with the power struggles which occur within that relationship. Power struggles occur on many levels, but Millay works in "Sonnet xxxi"
In the poem Recuerdo, by Edna St. Vincent Millay, New York takes the backseat. Unlike many NYC based poems, the primary focus of this poem is not on the city itself, but on the people. Recuerdo focuses on the mind of one person, who, like the title implies, is trying to remember. Despite being drunk, her few hazy memories suggest a happy night spent with a lover, adventuring around the city. The poem is vague and fast-paced, intentionally replicating the state of the speaker’s mind, but the speaker
The Sonnet by Edna St. Vincent Millay, “Love is Not All” demonstrates an unpleasant feeling about the knowledge of love with the impression to consider love as an unimportant element that does not worth dying for; the poem is a personal message addressing the intensity, importance, and transitory nature of love. The poet’s impression reflects her general point of view about love as portrays in the title “Love is Not All.” However, the unfolding part of the poem reveals the sarcastic truth that love
An Examination of the Complexities of Love in Millay's Poem, Love Is Not All [Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink] Edna St. Vincent Millay It is said that Millay's later work is more of a mirror image of her life. This particular poem was written 1931, when she was thirty-nine. Unlike some of her earlier work this is not a humorous poem. It is very deep and meaningful. This is a complex poem. She even began with a complex idea, love. What exactly is love? Is it a feeling, an emotion
Edna St. Vincent Millay begins her second paragraph of Renascence, she describes herself as joyous of her coming death. Millay has been telling the reader of her frustration and anguish as she lies on the ground burdened by the sin of her life. She cries out in sheer pain, "Ah, awful weight!" She actually describes herself as "craving" death. The dying experience was becoming so painful for Millay, that she just wanted the process to be finished. The second paragraph welcomes Millay into her
lifting and my getting bigger, just like the song by Survivor, “Eye of the Tiger”, does for me. It keeps in mind what it’s going to take to do this. The second piece of inspiration I like is, “I will put Chaos into fourteen lines”, by Edna St. Vincent Millay. On a depressing side of things, I am then moving on to a more disheartening type of poem. This poem is “Facing It”, by Yusef Komunyakaa. In “The Tyger”, by Blake, I really enjoy many lines of this poem. This whole poem gets me going. In line
Edna St. Vincent Millay’s sonnet, “What lips my lips have kissed and where and why” Edna St. Vincent Millay’s sonnet, “What lips my lips have kissed and where and why,” is about being, physically or mentally jaded, and thinking back to the torrid love of one’s youth. The “ghosts” that haunt her are the many lovers of her past; she’s specifically trying to remember them all. She recalls the passion she experienced and how there was a certain feeling within herself. Millay shows this through her
In the sonnet “VII” by Edna St. Vincent Millay and poem “Forgetfulness” by Billy Collins, the poets use a variety of techniques to illustrate two different yet similar meanings. In VII Millay tells a story of depression using analogies of darkness, yet in Collins poem he uses quippy humor to accept his fate with resignation. Both poems are easily relatable and come thick with meaning. In “VII” by Edna St. Vincent Millay and “Forgetfulness” by Billy Collins, both poets use literary devices to evoke