Edna St. Vincent Millay quotes on aging, beauty, books, children, earth, god, grief, hate, death, love, memories, hills, rain, sleep, songs, summer and much more.
98 Top Edna St. Vincent Millay Quotes For A Better Understanding Of Life
Edna St. Vincent Millay was a celebrated American poet, writer and activist who wrote some of the best sonnets in the world. She was honored with many awards for her work. It is a lesser-known fact that she is one of the few female poets to receive the prestigious “Pulitzer Prize for Poetry” for her work ‘The Ballad of the Harp Weaver’. Her novel titled ‘A Few Figs from Thistles’ raised a few eyebrows as it preached about female sexuality and feminism. The general theme of her work was based on individualism and contemplation of oneself through spirituality in the face of oppression due to gender bias. It glorified women rights and feministic approach which inspired many women to view matters of life in a different manner. Her work intended to spark a revolution for changing the mindset of a common man in the society. Even though she died early, her legacy remains forever in the hearts of the womenfolk in her country and all over the globe. Being a noted writer and poet, she shared her thoughts and views on several things. Many of her thoughts have become famous as her quotes and they are quoted extensively. We have compiled Edna St. Vincent Millay’s quotes from her writings, speeches etc. Browse through Edna Millay’s quotes on aging, beauty, books, children, earth, god, grief, hate, death, love, memories, hills, rain, sleep, songs, summer and much more.
They say when you are missing someone that they are probably feeling the same, but I don't think it's possible for you to miss me as much as I'm missing you right now
Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell.
Childhood is not from birth to a certain age and at a certain age. The child is grown, and puts away childish things. Childhood is the kingdom where nobody dies.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
After all my erstwhile dear, my no longer cherished;
Need we say it was not love, just because it perished?
Night falls fast.
Today is in the past.
Blown from the dark hill hither to my door
Three flakes, then four
Arrive, then many more.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Ebb
I know what my heart is like
Since your love died:
It is like a hollow ledge
Holding a little pool
Left there by the tide,
A little tepid pool,
Drying inward from the edge.
She is happy where she lies
With the dust upon her eyes.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
A person who publishes a book willfully appears before the populace with his pants down. If it is a good book nothing can hurt him. If it is a bad book nothing can help him.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Please give me some good advice in your next letter. I promise not to follow it. (in a letter written while she was in college)
Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;
Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.
I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.
A Poem from Edna St. Vincent Millay:
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?
But you, you foolish girl, you have gone home to a leaky castle across the sea to lie awake in linen smelling of lavender, and hear the nightingale, and long for me.
And must I then, indeed, Pain, live with you
all through my life?-sharing my fire, my bed,
Sharing-oh, worst of all things!-the same head?-
And, when I feed myself, feeding you too?
To a Young Poet
Time cannot break the bird's wing from the bird.
Bird and wing together
Go down, one feather.
No thing that ever flew,
Not the lark, not you,
Can die as others do.
I dread no more the first white in my hair,
Or even age itself, the easy shoe,
The cane, the wrinkled hands, the special chair:
Time, doing this to me, may alter too
My anguish, into something I can bear
And her voice is a string of colored beads,
Or steps leading into the sea.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
A person who publishes a book appears willfully in public eye with his pants down.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
When you are corn and roses and at rest
I shall endure, a dense and sanguine ghost
To haunt the scene where I was happiest
To bend above the thing I loved the most
Oh, friend, forget not, when you fain would note
In me a beauty that was never mine,
How first you knew me in a book I wrote,
How first you loved me for a written line....
Degraded bird, I give you back your eyes forever, ascend now whither you are tossed;
Forsake this wrist, forsake this rhyme;
Soar, eat ether, see what has never been seen; depart, be lost,
But climb.
...but the rain
Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh
Upon the glass and listen for reply...
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Catch from the board of beauty/ Such careless crumbs as fall.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Yet here one time your spirit was wont to move;
Here might I hope to find you day or night,
And here I come to look for you, my love,
Even now, foolishly, knowing you are dead.
Relaxing me from head to feet
Love masters me, the bitter sweet
O'er thy limbs breathing;
Yea, Eros now, the god born blind
Sweeps my soul like the mountain wind
Through the oaks seething.
The sun that warmed our stooping backs and withered the weed
uprooted-
We shall not feel it again.
We shall die in darkness, and be buried in the rain.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
And you as well must die, beloved dust,
And all your beauty stand you in no stead;
This flawless, vital hand, this perfect head,
This body of flame and steel, before the gust.
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