The Goose-Girl
Spring rides no horses down the hill,
But comes on foot, a goose-girl still.
And all the loveliest things there be
Come simply, so, it seems to me.
If ever I said, in grief or pride,
I tired of honest things, I lied;
And should be cursed forevermore
With Love in laces, like a whore,
And neighbors cold, and friends unsteady,
And Spring on horseback, like a lady!
("Goose-Girl" relates to the Brothers Grimm)
Millay wrote the poem in 1920.
from Fatal Interview (1931)
L.
The heart once broken is a heart no more,
And is absorbed from all a heart must be;
All that it signed or chartered heretofore
Is cancelled now, the bankrupt heart is free;
So much of duty as you may require
Of shards and dust, this and no more of pain,
This and no more of hope, remorse, desire,
The heart once broken need support again.
How simple 'tis, and what a little sound
It makes in breaking, let the world attest:
It struggles, and it fails; the world goes round,
And the moon follows it. Heart in my breast,
'Tis half a year now since you broke in two;
The world's forgotten well, if the world knew.
__________________
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Selected Poems, annotated edition
edited by Timothy F. Jackson
introduction by Holly Peppe
Yale 2016
An exquisite collection, nicely annotated throughout with steward-care from Holly Peppe in the introduction.
Perhaps the finest collection yet to present the poet, or to be re-acquainted.
