Chicks I Like: Figs and Thistles Edition

Today is a very special day, my friends: the 116th birthday of my favorite poet, Edna St. Vincent Millay!

(February 22, 1892–October 19, 1950)

As you may know, Millay was the first woman ever to win the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, for her book The Harp-Weaver, and Other Poems. You might know her long poem "Renascence," or if you grew up in NYC you might remember her "Recuerdo" as among the early batch of poems up in the subways (back when they were still good). But her best-known poem is probably "First Fig," which in its entirety goes:

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!

Truthfully, she may be most famous for her bisexuality and her bohemian lifestyle. (But then whom among us is not?) She was one of those Greenwich-Village-in-the-1920's types* who had lots of beautiful affairs with lots of brilliant people, and when she married in 1923, she and her husband had an open relationship. Part of my love for her is due to her awareness of the masculinity within her--she sometimes wrote from a man's perspective and as a child went by "Vincent," as she thought "Edna" was plain. Her poetry is beautiful and lyrical (often with a 'fear of commitment' theme, which is always fun), and she turned political as World War II drew nigh, so good on her. She died in her early 50's, less than a year after her husband died. Now, on her birthday, I share with you my favorite of her poems--which is also my favorite poem, period. You can probably tell why.

Witch-Wife

She is neither pink nor pale,
And she never will be all mine;
She learned her hands in a fairy-tale,
And her mouth on a valentine.

She has more hair than she needs;
In the sun 'tis a woe to me!
And her voice is a string of coloured beads,
Or steps leading into the sea.

She loves me all that she can,
And her ways to my ways resign;
But she was not made for any man,
And she never will be all mine.

This is, of course, a small sample of how wonderful her work is. But you don't have to take my word for it!


*In high school I used to make pilgrimages to the tiny house on Bedford Street where she'd lived for the years during which she wrote Harp-Weaver and met her husband. It had been converted from a stable and is about 9 feet wide, no joke.