Poem du jour: Millay

[qatarperegrine]

On a lighter note, I have been surprised to discover this week that I kinda dig Edna St. Vincent Millay's sonnets. (I just loathe the stuff in quatrains. Quatrains are evil.) So, in honor of (a) National Poetry Month and (b) U.S. tax day, here is a poem that at least starts out talking about taxes, although it ends somewhere rather different.

We talk of taxes, and I call you friend;
Well, such you are,--but well enough we know
How thick about us root, how rankly grow
Those subtle weeds no man has need to tend,
That flourish through neglect, and soon must send
Perfume too sweet upon us and overthrow
Our steady senses; how such matters go
We are aware, and how such matters end.
Yet shall be told no meagre passion here;
With lovers such as we forevermore
Isolde drinks the draught, and Guinevere
Receives the Table's ruin through her door,
Francesca, with the loud surf at her ear,
Lets fall the colored book upon the floor.

-Edna St. Vincent Millay, from Second April

(More Millay sonnets can be found here and here. I'm particularly fond of "Time does not bring relief; you all have lied," "Only until this cigarette is ended," and "Here is a wound that never will heal, I know.")

Comments

[meshach.livejournal.com]

Oh, I adore her stuff. I actualy have a book of her poems here if you want to borrow it.