 Renascence by Edna St. Vincent Malay. Red for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson. All I could see from where I stood was three long mountains and a wood. I turned and looked another way and saw three islands in a bay. So with my eyes I traced the line of the horizon, thin and fine, straight round till I was come back to where I'd started from. And all I saw from where I stood was three long mountains and a wood. Over these things I could not see. These were the things that bounded me, and I could touch them with my hand. Almost I thought from where I stand, and all at once things seemed so small my breath came short and scarce at all. But sure this guy is big, I said, miles and miles above my head, so here upon my back I'll lie, and look my fill into the sky. And so I looked and after all the sky was not so very tall. The sky I said must somewhere stop, and sure enough I see the top. The sky I thought is not so grand, I most could touch it with my hand. And reaching up my hand to try, I screamed to feel it touch the sky. I screamed in low, infinity came down and settled over me, forced back my scream into my chest, bent back my arm upon my breast, and pressing of the undefined the definition on my mind, held up before my eyes a class through which my shrinking sight did pass, until it seemed I must behold immensity made manifold, whispered to me a word whose sound deafened the air for worlds around, and brought unbuffled to my ears the gossiping of friendly spheres, the creaking of the tinted sky, the ticking of eternity. I saw and heard in you at last the how and why of all things, past and present and forever more. The universe cleft to the core lay open to my probing sense. At sickening I would feign plucked thence, but could not, nay. But knees must suck at the great wood that could not pluck my lips away till I had drawn all venom out. Ah, fearful pawn, for my omniscience paid I toll in infinite remorse of soul. All sin was my sinning, all atoning mine, and mine the gall of all regret. Mine was the weight of every brooded wrong, the hate that stood behind every envious thrust, mine every greed, mine every lust, and all the while for every grief each suffering I craved relief with individual desire. Craved all in vain, and felt fierce fire about a thousand people crawl, perished with each, then mourned for all. A man was starving in Capri. He moved his eyes and looked at me. I felt his gaze. I heard his moan, and knew his hunger is my own. I saw at sea a great fog bank between two ships that struck and sank. A thousand screams the heavens smoked, and every scream tore through my throat. No hurt I did not feel, no death that was not mine, mine each last breath that cried met an answering cry from the compassion that was I. All suffering mine, and mine its rod, mine pity like the pity of God. Aw, awful weight! Infinity pressed down upon the finite me. My anguished spirit like a bird beating against my lips I heard. Yet lay the weight so close about there was no room for it without. And so beneath the weight lay I and suffered death, but could not die. Long had I lained thus, craving death when quietly the earth beneath gave way, an inch by inch so great at last I'd grown the crushing weight into the earth I sank, till I, full six feet underground, did lie, and sank no more. There is no weight can follow here, however great. From off my breast I felt it roll, and as it went my tortured soul burst forth and fled in such a gust that all about me swirled the dust. Deep in the earth I rested now, cool is its hand upon the brow, and soft its breast beneath the head, of one who is so gladly dead. And all at once and over all the pitting rain began to fall. I lay and heard each pattering hoof upon my lowly thatched roof, and seemed to love the sound far more than ever I had done before. For rain it had the friendly sound to one who six feet underground, and scarce the friendly voice or face, aggrave, is such a quiet place. The rain, I said, is kind to come, and speak to me in my new home. I would I were alive again to kiss the fingers of the rain, to drink into my eyes the shine of every slanting silver line, to catch the freshened, fragrant breeze from drenched in dripping apple trees. For soon the shower will be done, and then the broad face of the sun will laugh above the rain-soaked earth, until the world with answering mirth shakes joyously, and each round drop rolls twinkling from its grass-blade top. How can I bear it buried here, while overhead the sky grows clear and blue again after the storm? A multicolored, multi-form, beloved beauty over me, that I shall never, never see again. Spring-sour, autumn-gold, that I shall never more behold, sleeping your mirrored magics through, clothes sepulchred away from you. O God, I cried give me new birth, and put me back upon the earth. Upset each cloud's gigantic gourd and let the heavy rain downpour'd in one big torrent set me free, washing my grave away from me. I ceased, and threw the breathless hush that answered me. The far-off rush of herald wings came whispering like music down the vibrant stream of my ascending prayer, and crushed before the wild winds whistling lash the startled storm-clouds reared on high and plunged in terror down the sky, and the big rain in one black wave fell from the sky and struck my grave. I knew not how such things can be. I only know there came to me a fragrance such as never clings to ought save happy living things, a sound as of some joyous elf singing sweet songs to please himself, and through and over everything a sense of glad awakening. The grass, a tiptoe at my ear, whispering to me I could hear. I felt the rain's cool fingertips brushed tinderly across my lips, laid gently on my sealid sight, and all at once the heavy night fell from my eyes, and I could see. A drenched and dripping apple-tree, a last long line of silver rain, a sky grown clear and blue again, and as I looked a quickening gust of wind blew up to me and thrust into my face a miracle of orchard breath, and with the smell I know not how such things can be. I breathed my soul back into me, up then from the ground-spraying eye and held the earth with such a cry as is not heard save from a man who has been dead and lives again. Not the trees my arms I wound, like one gone mad I hugged the ground. I raised my quivering arms on high. I laughed and laughed into the sky, dill at my throat a strangling sob caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb sent instant tears into my eyes. Oh God, I cried! No dark disguise can air here after hide from me thy radiant identity. Thou canst not move across the grass, but my quick eyes will see thee pass, nor speak, however silently, but my hushed voice will answer thee. I know the path that tells thy way through the cool eve of every day. God, I can push the grass apart and lay my finger on thy heart. The world stands out on either side no wider than the heart is wide. Above the world is stretched the sky, no higher than the soul is high. The heart can push the sea and land farther away on either hand. The soul can spit the sky in two and let the face of God shine through, but east and west will pinch the heart that cannot keep them pushed apart, and he whose soul is flat the sky will cave in on him by and by in the poem. This recording is in the public domain. God's World by Edna St. Vincent Millay readforlibbervox.org Oh world, I cannot hold thee close enough. Thy winds, thy wide gray skies. Thy mists, that roll and rise. Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag and all but cry with color. That gaunt crag to crush, to lift the lean of that black bluff. World, world, I cannot get thee close enough. Long have I known a glory in it all, but never knew I this. Here such a passion is as stretches me apart. Lord, I do fear doused made the world too beautiful this year. My soul is all but out of me. Let fall, no burning leaf, privy, let no bird call. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Afternoon on a Hill by Edna St. Vincent Millay readforlibbervox.org I will be the gladdest thing under the sun. I will touch a hundred flowers and not pick one. I will look at cliffs and clouds with quiet eyes. Watch the wind bow down the grass, and the grass rise. And when lights begin to show up from the town, I will mark which must be mine, and then start down. End of Poem This recording is in the public domain. Journey by Edna St. Vincent Millay readforlibbervox.org by Josh Kibbe. Ah, could I lay me down in this long grass and close my eyes and let the quiet wind blow over me. I am so tired, so tired of passing pleasant places. All my life following care along the dusty road have I looked back at loveliness inside. Yet at my hand an unrelenting hand tugged ever, and I passed. All my life long over my shoulder have I looked at peace, and now I feign would lie in this long grass and close my eyes. Yet onward, cat birds call through the long afternoon and creeks at dusk are guttural, whip poor whales, wake and cry, drawing the twilight close about their throats. Only my heart makes answer. Eager vines go up the rocks and wait, flushed apple trees pause in their dance and break the ring for me. Dim shady wood roads, redolent of fern and bayberry, that through sweet bevy's thread, of round-faced roses, pink and petulant, look back and beckon air they disappear. Only my heart, only my heart responds. Yet, ah, my path is sweet on either side all through the dragging day, sharp underfoot and hot and like dead mist the dry dust hangs. But far, oh, far as passionate I can reach, and long, ha, long as rapturous I can cling. The world is mine, blue hill, still silver lake, broad field, bright flower, and the long white road, a gaitless garden and an open path. My feet to follow and my heart to hold. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Sorrow. By Edna St. Vincent Millay. Red4Libervox.org. Sorrow, like a ceaseless rain, beats upon my heart. People twist and scream in pain. Dawn will find them still again. This has neither wax nor wane, neither stop nor start. People dress and go to town. I sit in my chair. All my thoughts are slow and brown. Standing up or sitting down, little matters, or what gown or what shoes I wear. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Tavern. By Edna St. Vincent Millay. Red4Libervox.org. I'll keep a little tavern below the high hills crest, wherein all grey-eyed people may sit them down and rest. There shall be plates aplenty and mugs to melt the chill of all the grey-eyed people who happen up the hill. Their sound will sleep the traveler and dream his journey's end. But I will rouse at midnight the falling fire to tend. I, tis a curious fancy, but all the good I know, was taught me out of two grey eyes a long time ago. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Ashes of Life by Edna St. Vincent Millay. Red4Libervox.org by Larry Wilson. Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike. Eat I must and sleep I will, and would that night were here. But, ah, to lie awake and hear the slow hours strike, would that it were day again with twilight near. Love has gone and left me and I don't know what to do. This or that or what you will is all the same to me. But all the things that I begin I leave before I'm through. There's little use in anything as far as I can see. Love has gone and left me and the neighbors knock and borrow and life goes on forever like the nine of a mouse. And tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. There's this little street and this little house. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Little Ghost by Edna St. Vincent Millay. Read for LibreVox.org by Nima. The Little Ghost I knew her for a little ghost that in my garden walked. The wall is high, higher than most, and the green gate was locked. And yet I did not think of that till after she was gone. I knew her by the broad white hat, all ruffled she had on. By the deer ruffles round her feet, by her small hands that hung in their lace mitts, austere and sweet, her gowns white folds among. I watched to see if she would stay, what she would do and owe. She looked as if she liked the way I let my garden grow. She bent above my favorite mint with conscious garden grace. She smiled and smiled. There was no hint of sadness in her face. She held her gown on either side to let her slipper show. And up the walk she went with pride, the way great ladies go. And where the wall is built anew and is a vivy bear, she paused and opened and passed through a gate that once was there. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Kin to Sorrow by Edna St. Vincent Millay. Red for Librebox.org by Mike Overby, Midland Washington. Am I Kin to Sorrow? That soft falls the knocker of my door, neither loud nor soft, but as long accustomed under Sorrow's hand. Marigolds around the step and Rosemary stand, and then come Sorrow. And what does Sorrow care for the Rosemary or the Marigolds there? Am I Kin to Sorrow? Are we Kin? That's so off the palm my door. Oh, come in. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Three Songs of Shattering by Edna St. Vincent Millay. Red for Librebox.org by Pharah Iftigar. The first rose on my rose tree, budded, bloomed and shattered. During sad days went to me, nothing mattered. Grief of grief has drained me clean. Still it seems a pity. No one saw. It must have been very pretty. Let the little birds sing, let the little lambs play. Spring is here, and so to spring, but not in the old way. I recall a place where a plum tree grew. There you lifted up your face and blossoms covered you. If the little birds sing and the little lambs play, spring is here and so to spring, but not in the old way. All the dark wood blossoms are underneath the tree. Here spring was going. Ah, spring is gone. And there comes no summer to the like of you and me. Blossom time is early, but no fruit sets on. All the dark wood blossoms are underneath the tree, browned at the edges, turned in a day. And I would with all my heart they trimmed a mound for me. And weeds put all on all the paths that led that way. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Shroud by Edna St Vincent Millay. Read for LibriVox.org by Farah Iftikar. Death, I say, my heart is bowed, unto thine, oh mother, this red gown will make a shroud, good as any other. I that would not wait to wear my own bridal things in a dress dark as my hair made my answerings. I tonight that till he came could not, could not wait in a gown as bright as flame held for them the gate. Death, I say, my heart is bowed, unto thine, oh mother, this red gown will make a shroud, good as any other. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. The Dream by Edna St Vincent Millay. Read for LibriVox.org by Nima. The Dream. Love, if I weep it will not matter and if you laugh I shall not care. Foolish am I to think about it, but it is good to feel you there. Love, in my sleep I dreamed of waking, white and awful the moonlight reached over the floor and somewhere, somewhere, there was a shutter loose, it screeched, swung in the wind and no wind blowing. I was afraid and turned to you, put out my hand to you for comfort and you were gone, cold, cold as dew. Under my hand the moonlight play. Love, if you laugh I shall not care, but if I weep it will not matter. Ah, it is good to feel you there. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Indifference by Edna St Vincent Millay. Read for LibriVox.org by Josh Kibbe. I said, for love was laggard, oh, love was slow to come. I'll hear his step and know his step when I am warm in bed, but I'll never leave my pillow, though there be some as would let him in and take him in with tears. I said, I lay, for love was laggard, oh, he came not until dawn. I lay and listened for his step and could not get to sleep. And he found me at my window with my big cloak on, all sorry with the tears some folks might weep. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Witch-Wife by Edna St Vincent Millay. Read for LibriVox.org. 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 colored 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. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Blight by Edna St Vincent Millay. Read for LibriVox.org. by Farah Iftikar. Hard seeds of hate I planted that should by now be grown. Rough stalks of from thick stamens, poisonous pollen blown, and odours rank unbreathable from dark corolla's throne. At dawn from my damp garden I shook the chilly dew. The thin boughs locked behind me that sprung to let me through. The blossoms slept. I sought a place where nothing lovely grew. And there, when day was breaking, I knelt and looked around. The light was near. The silence was palpitant with sound. I drew my hate from out my breast and thrust it in the ground. Oh ye so fiercely tended, ye little seeds of hate, I bent above your growing early and noon and late. Yet are ye drooped and pitiful? I cannot rear you straight. The sun seeks out my garden. No nook is left in shade. No mist, no mould, no mildew endures on any blade. Sweet rain slants under every bough. Ye falter and ye fade. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. When the year grows old by Edna St Vincent Millay, read for LibriVox.org by Farah Iftikar. I cannot but remember when the year grows old. October, November, how she disliked the cold. She used to watch the swallows go down across the sky and turn from the window with a little sharp sigh. And often when the brown leaves were brittle on the ground and the wind in the chimney made a melancholy sound. She had a look about her that I wish I could forget. The look of a scared thing sitting in a net. Oh, beautiful at nightfall the soft spitting snow and beautiful the bear boughs rubbing to and fro. But the roaring of the fire and the warmth of fur and the boiling of the kettle were beautiful to her. I cannot but remember when the year grows old. October, November, how she disliked the cold. End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. Six thoughts by Edna St. Vincent Malay Read for LibriVox.org Valerie Wilson. One. Thou art not lovelier than Lilex. No, nor honeysuckle. Thou art not more fair than small white single poppies. I can bear thy beauty. Though I've been before thee both from left to right not knowing where to go I turn my troubled eyes nor here nor there find any refuge from thee. Yet I swear so it has been with mist, with moonlight so. Like him who day by day unto his draught of delicate poison adds him one drop more till he may drink unharmed the death of ten. Even so enured to beauty who have quaffed each hour more than the hour before I drink and live what has destroyed some men. Two. Time does not bring relief. You all have lied who told me time would ease me of my pain. I miss him in the weeping of the rain. I want him at the shrinking of the tide. The old snows melt from every mountainside and last year's leaves are smoked in every lane. Last year's bitter loving must remain heaped on my heart and my old thoughts abide. There are a hundred places where I fear to go so with his memory they brim and entering with relief some quiet place where never fell his foot or shown his face I say there is no memory of him here and so stands tricking so remembering him. Three. Mindful of you the sudden earth in spring and all the flowers that in the spring time grow and dusty roads and thistles in the slow rising of the round moon all throats that sing the summer through and each departing wing and all the nest that the baird branches show and all winds that in any weather blow and all the storms that the four seasons bring. You go no more on your exultant feet of paths that only missed in morning new or watch the wind or listen to the beat of a bird's wings too high in air to view but you were something more than young and sweet and fair and the long year remembers you. Four. Not in this chamber only at my birth when the long hours of that mysterious night were over and the morning was in sight I cried but in strange places and first I have not seen through an alien grief and mirth and never shall one room contain me quite who in so many rooms first saw the light child of all mothers native of the earth so is no warmth for me at any fire today when the world's fire has burned so low I kneel spending my breath in vain desire on that cold hearth which one time wards so strong and back in weariness and long to gather up my little gods and go. Five. If I should learn in some quite casual way that you were gone not to return again read from the back page of a paper say held by a neighbor in a subway train how at the corner of this avenue in such a street so are the papers filled a hurry man who happened to be you at noon today had happened to be killed cry allowed I could not cry allowed or ring my hands in such a place I should but watch the station lights rush by with a more careful interest on my face or raise my eyes and read with greater care where to store first and how to treat the hair. Six. Bluebeard this door you might not open and you did so enter now and see for what slight thing are betrayed here is no treasure hid no cauldron no clear crystal mirion the sought for truth no heads of women slain for greed like yours no writhings of distress but only what you see look yet again in an empty room cobwebbed and comfortless yet this alone out of my life I kept unto myself lest any know me quite you did so profane me when you crept unto the threshold of this room tonight that I must never more behold your face this now is yours I seek another place in the poem this recording is in the public domain section two poems one and two by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson one my candle burns at both ends it will not last the night but are my foes and oh my friends it gives a lovely light two safe upon the solid rock the ugly houses stand come and see my shining palace built upon the sand in the poem this recording is in the public domain by Edna St. Millay read for LibriVox.org by Peter Yersley we were very tired we were very merry we had gone back and forth all night on the ferry it was bare and bright and smelled like a stable but we looked into a fire we leaned across a table we lay on a hilltop underneath the moon and the whistles kept blowing north all night on the ferry and you ate an apple and I ate a pear from a dozen of each we had brought somewhere and the sky went one and the wind came cold and the sun rose dripping a bucket full of gold we were very tired we were very merry we had gone back and forth all night on the ferry we hailed good morrow mother to a shawl covered head which neither of us read and she wept God bless you for the apples and pears and we gave her all our money but our subway fares end of poem this recording is in the public domain Thursday by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibriVox.org by Nima Thursday and if I loved you Wednesday well what is that to you I do not love you Thursday so much is true and why you come complaining is more than I can see I loved you Wednesday yes but what is that to me end of poem this recording is in the public domain to the not impossible him by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibriVox.org by Kathleen how shall I know unless I go to Cairo and Cathay whether or not this blessed spot is blessed in every way now it may be the flower for me is this beneath my nose how shall I tell unless I smell the Carthaginian rose the fabric of my faithful love no power shall dim or revel whilst I stay here but oh my dear if I should ever travel end of poem this recording is in the public domain The Singing Woman from the Woods Edge by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibriVox.org by Kathleen what should I be but a prophet and a liar whose mother was a leprechaun whose father was a friar teethed on a crucifix and cradled under water what should I be but the fiend's god daughter and who should be my playmates but they had her in the frog that was got beneath a furs bush and born in a bog and what should be my singing that was christened at an altar but aves and kratos and psalms out of the salter you will see such webs on the wet grass maybe as a pixie mother weaves for her baby you will find such flames at the waves weedy ebb as flashes in the meshes of a murmur mother's web but there comes to birth a common spawn from the love of a priest for a leprechaun and you never have seen and you never will see such things as the things that swaddled me after all said and after all's done what should I be but a harlot and a nun in through the bushes on any foggy day my dad would come a swishing of the drops away with a prayer for my death and a groan for my birth a mumbling of his beads for all that he was worth and there'd sick my ma with her knees beneath her chin a looking in his face and a drinking of it in and a marking in the moss some funny little saying that would mean just the opposite of all that he was praying he taught me the holy talk of vesper and of matin he heard me my greek and he heard me my latin he blessed me and crossed me to keep my soul from evil and we watched him out of sight he heard up the devil oh the things I haven't seen and the things I haven't known what with hedges and ditches till after I was groan and yanked both ways by my mother and my father with a witch would you better and a witch would you rather with him for a sire and her for a dam what should I be but just what I am end of poem this recording is in the public domain humorous Vincent Malay readforlaborbox.org by Kathleen heaven bless the babe they said what queer books she must have read love by whom I was beguiled grant I may not bear a child little does she guess today what the world may be they say snow drift deep and cover till the spring my murdered lover end of poem this recording is in the public domain she is overheard singing by Edna St. Vincent Malay readforlaborbox.org by Kathleen oh proof she has a patient man and Joan a gentle lover and Agatha's earth is a hug the hearth but my true love's a rover make her mans as good as cheese and honest as a briar Sue tells her love what he's thinking of but my dear lads a liar oh Sue and proof and Agatha are thick with Meg and Joan they bite their threads and shake their heads and gnaw my name like a bone and proof says minds a patient man as never snaps me up and Agatha earth is a hug the hearth could live content in a cup Sue's mans mind is like good gel all in color and clear there's no call to think at all what's to come next year while Joan makes boast of a gentle lad that's troubled with that and this but they all would give the life they live for a look from the man I kiss cold he slants his eyes about and few enough's his choice though he'd slip me clean for a nun or a queen or a beggar with knots in her voice and Agatha will turn awake and sleep sound and Meg and Sue and Joan and proof will hear the clock strike round for proof she has a patient man as asks not when or why and Meg and Sue have not to do but people's passing by Joan is paired with a putter that bastes and tastes and salts and Agatha's earth is a hug the hearth but my true love is false and of poem this recording is in the public domain The Unexplore by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreVox.org by Josh Kibbey there was a road ran past our house too lovely to explore I asked my mother once she said that if you followed where it led it brought you to the milkman's door that's why I have not traveled more end of poem this recording is in the public domain grown up by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreVox.org 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 end of poem this recording is in the public domain The Penitent by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreVox.org by Larry Wilson I had a little sorrow born of a little sin I found in a room all damp with gloom and shut us all within and little sorrow weep I said I and little sin prayed God to die and I upon the floor will lie and think how bad I've been alas for pious planning it mattered not of wit as far as gloom went in that room the lamp might have been lit my little sorrow would not weep my little sin would not go to sleep to save my soul I could not keep my graceless mind on it so up I got an anger and took a book I had and put a ribbon on my hair to please a passing lad and one thing there's no getting by I've been a wicked girl said I but if I can't be sorry why I might as well be glad end of poem this recording is in the public domain Daphne by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreVox.org by Amy Cremor why do you follow me any moment I can be nothing but a laurel tree any moment of the chase I can leave you in my place a pink bow for your embrace yet if over hell and hollow still it is your will to follow I am off to heal Apollo end of poem this recording is in the public domain portrait by a neighbor by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreVox.org by Amy Cremor before she has her floor swept or her dishes done any day you'll find her a sunning in the sun it's long after midnight her keys in the lock and you never see her chimney smoke till past ten o'clock she digs in her garden with a shovel and a spoon she weeds her lazy lettuce by the light of the moon she walks up the walk like a woman in a dream she forgets she borrowed butter and pays you back cream her lawn looks like a meadow and if she mows the place she leaves the clover standing in the queen Anne's lace end of poem this recording is in the public domain The Mary Made by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreVox.org by Larry Wilson oh I am grown so free from care since my heart broke I set my throat against the air I laugh at simple folk there's little kind and little fair is worth its weight in smoke to me that's grown so free from care since my heart broke last, if to sleep you would repair as peaceful as you won't best not to besiege your lover there for just the words he spoke to me that's grown so free from care since my heart broke end of poem this recording is in the public domain to SM by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreVox.org by Peter Yersley if he should lie a-dying I am not willing you should go into the earth where Helen went she is awake by now I know where Cleopatra's anklets rust you will not lie with my consent and Sappho is a roving dust Cressid could love again Dido rotted in state is restless still you leave me much against my will end of poem this recording is in the public domain The Philosopher by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreVox.org by Peter Yersley and what are you that wanting you I should be kept awake as many nights as there are days with weeping for your sake and what are you that missing you as many days as crawl I should be listening to the wind and looking at the wall I know a man that's a braver man and twenty men as kind and what are you that you should be the one man in my mind yet women's ways are witless ways as any sage will tell and what am I that I should love so wisely and so well end of poem this recording is in the public domain Four Sonnets by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreVox.org by Bruce Kachuk one love though for this you riddle me with darts and drag me at your chariot till I die oh heavy prince oh panderer of hearts yet hear me tell how in their throats they lie who shout you mighty sick about my hair day in, day out your ominous arrows purr who still am free let us care a fool and in no temple worshiper I that have bared me to your quivers fire lifted my face into its puny rain do wreath you impotent to evoke desire as you are powerless to elicit pain now will the god for blasphemy so brave punish me early with the shaft I crave two I think I should have loved you presently and given in earnest words I flung in jest and lifted honest eyes for you to see and caught your hand against my cheek and breast and all my pretty follies flung aside that one you to me and beneath your gaze and shorn of pride spread like a chart my little wicked ways I that had been to you had you remained but one more waking from a recurrent dream cherished no less the certain stakes I gained and walk your memories halls or steer supreme a ghost in marble of a girl you knew who would have loved you in a day or two three oh think not I am faithful to a vow faithless am I save to love's self alone were you not lovely I would leave you now after the feet of beauty fly my own were you not still my hunger's rarest food and water ever and my wildest thirst I would desert you think not but I would and seek another as I sought you first but you are mobile as the veering air and all your charms more changeful than the tide wherefore to be in constant is no care I have but to continue at your side so wanton light and falls my love are you I am most faithless when I most am true four I shall forget you presently my dear so make the most of this your little day your little month your little half a year ere I forget or die or move away and we are done for ever by and by I shall forget you as I said but now if you entreat me with your loveliest lie I will protest you with my favorite vow I would indeed that love were longer lived and oats were not so brittle as they are but so it is and nature has contrived to struggle on without a break thus far whether or not we find what we are seeking is idle biologically speaking end of poem this recording is in the public domain I know what I know the sun is hot on my neck as I observe the spikes of the crocus the smell of the earth is good it is apparent that there is no death but what does that signify not only underground are the brains of men eaten by maggots life in the south is nothing an empty cup a flight of uncarpeted stairs it is not enough that yearly down this hill April comes like an idiot babbling and stewing flowers end of poem this recording is in the public domain in their shade out of a shower undoubtedly would hear such music as is made upon a country tree all little leaves that are so dumb against the shrieking city air I watch you when the wind has come I know what sound is there end of poem this recording is in the public domain God had called us and we came our loved earth to ashes left heaven was a neighbor's house open flung to us bereft gay the lights of heaven showed and was God who walked ahead yet I wept along the road wanting my own house instead wept unseen unheeded cried all you things my eyes have kissed well we meet no more lovely lovely tattered mist weary wings that rise and fall all day long above the fire red with heat was every wall rough with heat was every wire fair you well you little winds that the flying embers chase fair you well you shuttering day with your hands before your face and ah blackened by strange blight or to a false sun unfurled now for evermore goodbye all the gardens in the world on the windless hills of heaven that I have no wish to see white eternal lily stand by a lake of ebony but the earth for evermore is a place where nothing grows dawn will come and no bud break evening and no blossom close spring will come and wander slow over an indifferent land stand beside an empty creek hold a dead seed in her hand God had called us and we came but the blessed road I trod was a bitter road to me and at heart I questioned God though in heaven I said be all that the heart would most desire held earth not save souls of sinners worth the saving from a fire withered grass the wasted growing this ache of laden boughs little things God had forgotten called me from my burning house though in heaven I said be all that the eye could ask to see all the things I ever knew are this blaze in back of me though in heaven I said be all that the ear could think to lack all the things I ever knew are this roaring at my back it was God who walked ahead the shepherd to the fold and his footsteps fared the weak and the weary and the old glad enough of gladness over ready for the peace to be but the thing God had forgotten was the growing bones of me and I drew a bit apart and I lagged a bit behind and I thought unpeace eternal lest he look into my mind and I gazed upon the sky and I thought of heavenly rest and I slipped away like water through the fingers of the blessed all their eyes were fixed on glory not a glance brushed over me alleluia alleluia up the road and I was free and my heart rose like a fresh it and it swept me on before giddy as a whirling stick till I felt the earth once more all the earth was charred and black had swept from pole to pole and the bottom of the sea was as brittle as a bowl and the timbered mountaintop was as naked as a skull nothing left nothing left of the earth so beautiful earth I said how can I leave you you are all I have I said what is left to take my mind up living always and you dead speak I said oh tell me something for a keepsake to keep always quick before God misses me and I listened for a voice but my heart was all I heard not a screech owl not a loon not a tree toad said a word and I waited for a sign coals and cinders nothing more and a little cloud of smoke floating on a valley floor and I peered into the smoke till it rotted like a fog there encompassed round by fire stood a blue flag in a bog little flames came waiting out straining draining towards its stem but it was so blue and tall that it scorned to think of them red and thirsty were their tongues as the tongues of wolves must be but it was so blue and tall oh I laughed I cried to see all my heart became a tear all my soul became a tower never loved I anything as I loved that tall blue flower it was all the little boats that had ever sailed the sea it was all the little books that had gone to school with me on its roots like iron claws rearing up so blue and tall it was all the gallant earth with its back against a wall in a breath ere I had breathed oh I laughed I cried to see I was kneeling at its side and it leaned its head on me crumbling stones and sliding sand is the road to heaven now I see at my straining knees drags the awful under-toe soon but stepping stones of dust will the road to heaven be father son and holy ghost reach a hand and rescue me there there my blue flag flower hush hush go to sleep that is only God you here counting up his folded sheep lullaby lullaby that is only God that calls missing me seeking me ere the road to nothing falls he will set his mighty feet firmly on the sliding sand like a little frightened bird I will creep into his hand I will tell him all my grief I will tell him all my sin he will give me half his robe for a cloak to wrap you in lullaby lullaby rocks the burnt out planet free father son and holy ghost reach a hand and rescue me ah the voice of love at last at last the face of light and the whole of his white robe for a cloak against the night and upon my heart to sleep all the things I ever knew holds heaven not some cranny lord so tall and blue all's well and all's well gay the lights of heaven show in some moist and heavenly place we will set it out to grow end of poem this recording is in the public domain eel grass by etna saint vince and mele read for liperfox.org by phone no matter what I say all that I really love is the rain that flattens on the bay and the eel grass in the curve the jingle shells that lie and bleach at the tide line and the trace of higher tides along the beach nothing in this place end of poem this recording is in the public domain still will be rose and rhododendron when you are dead and underground still will be heard from white syringes heavy with bees a sunny sound still will the tamaracks be raining after the rain has ceased and still will there be robins in the stubble brown sheep upon the warm green hill spring will not ale nor autumn falter nothing will know that you are gone saving alone some sullen plough land none but yourself sets foot upon saving the mayweed and the pigweed nothing will know that you are dead these and perhaps a useless wagon standing beside some tumbled shed oh there will pass with your great passing little of beauty not your own only the light from common water only the grace from simple stone end of poem this recording is in the public domain up so high this is how I came I put there my knee here my foot up and up from shoot to shoot and the blessed beanstalk thinning like the mischief all the time till it took me rocking spinning in a dizzy sunny circle making angles with the root far and out above the cackle of the city I was born in till the little dirty city in the light so sheer and sunny shone as dazzling bright and pretty as the money that you find in a dream of finding money what a wind what a morning till the tiny shiny city when I shot a glance below shaken with a giddy laughter sick and blissfully afraid was a dew drop on a blade and a pair of moments after was the whirling guess I made and the wind was like a whip cracking past my icy ears and my hair stood out behind and my eyes were full of tears wide open and cold more tears than they could hold the wind was blowing so and my teeth were in a row dry and grinning and I felt my foot slip and I scratched the wind and whined and I clutched the stalk and jabbered with my eyes shot blind what a wind what a wind your broad sky giant is the shelf of a cupboard I make beanstalks I'm a builder like yourself but beanstalks is my trade I couldn't make a shelf don't know how they're made now a beanstalk is more pliant law what a climb end of poem this recording is in the public domain Weeds by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreFox.org by phone white with daisies and red with sorrel and empty, empty under the sky life is a quest and love a quarrel here is a place for me to lie daisy spring from damned seeds and this red fire that here I see is a worthless crop of crimson weeds cursed by farmers thriftily that here unhated for an hour the sorrel runs in ragged flame the daisy stands a bastard flower like flowers that bear an honest name and here a while where no wind brings the being of a pack of thirst may sleep the sleep of blessed things the blood too bright the brow a cursed end of poem this recording is in the public domain Passer Mortus Est by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibreFox.org by Bruce Gachuk Death devours all lovely things Lesbia with her sparrow shares the darkness presently every bed is narrow unremembered as old rain dries the sheer libation and the little petulant hand is an annotation after all my erstwhile dear my no longer cherished need we say it was not love now that love is perished end of poem this recording is in the public domain Passer If it were only still with far away the shrill crying of a cock or the shaken bell from a cow's throat moving through the bushes or the soft shock of wisened apples falling from an old tree in a forgotten orchard upon the hilly rock oh grey hill where the grazing herd licks the purple blossom the spiky weed oh stony pasture where the tall mullion stands up so sturdy on its little seed end of poem this recording is in the public domain I am way laid by beauty who will walk between me and the crying of the frocks oh savage beauty suffer me to pass that I am a timid woman on her way from one house to another end of poem this recording is in the public domain the track is miles away and the day is loud with voices speaking yet there isn't a train goes by all day but I hear its whistle shrieking oh night there isn't a train goes by though the night is still for sleep and dreaming but I see its cinders red on the sky and hear its engine steaming the heart is warm with the friends I make and better friends I'll not be knowing yet there isn't a train I wouldn't take no matter where its going end of poem this recording is in the public domain these wet rocks where the tide has been barnacled white and weeded brown and slime beneath to a beautiful green these wet rocks where the tide went down will show again when the tide is high faint and perilous far from shore no place to dream but a place to die the bottom of the sea once more there was a child that wandered through a giant empty house all day house full of wonderful things and new but no fifth place for a child to play end of poem this recording is in the public domain of whispers full of sighs of dazzling mud and dingy snow hepaticas that pleased you so are here again and butterflies there rings a hammering all day and shingles lie about the doors in orchards near and far away the gray woodpecker taps and bores and men are merry at their chores the children earnest at their play the larger streams run still and deep noisy and swift the small brooks run among the mullen stalks the sheep go up the hillside in the sun pensively only you are gone you that alone I cared to keep end of poem in the public domain The Poet in His Book by Edna St. Vincent Millage read for LibraVox.org by Larry Wilson down your mongrel death back into your kennel I have stolen breath in a stalk of fennel you shall scratch and you shall whine many a night and you shall worry many a bone before you bury one sweet bone of mine when shall I be dead when my flesh is withered and above my head yellow pollen gathered all the empty afternoon when sweet lovers pause and wonder who I am that lie there under hidden from the moon this is my personal death that my lungs be failing to inhale the breath others are exhaling this is my subtle spear's end and when the thawed winter will be my friend me by no means dead in that hour but surely when this book unread brought to earth obscurely and no more to any breast close against the clamour swelling of the thing there is no telling are these pages pressed when this book is mold and a book of many waiting to be sold for a casual penny in a little open case in a street unclean and clutter that is patterned from the passing drays stranger pause and look when the dust of ages lift this little book turn the tattered pages read me do not let me die search the fading letters finding steadfast in the broken binding all that once was I when these veins are weeds when these hollowed sockets watch the rooty seeds bursting down like rockets and surmise the spring again or remote in that black cupboard watch the pink worms writhing upward at the smell of rain boys and girls that life whispering in the hedges do not let me die mix me with your pledges boys and girls that slowly walk in the woods and weep and quarrel staring past the pink wild laurel mix me with your talk do not let me die farmers that you're raking when the sun is high making when along the stubble stream withering on their stalks uneaten strawberries turn dark and sweeten in the laps of noon shepherds on the hills in the pastures drowsing to the tinkling bells of the brown sheep browsing sailors crying through the storm scholars at your study hunters lost amid the whirling winter's whiteness uniform men that long for sleep men that wake and revel men that long leap to your senses level at such moments may it be sometimes, though a moment only some forgotten quaint and homely vehicle of me women at your toil women at your leisure till the kettle boils snatch of me your pleasure where the broom straw marks the leaf women quite with your weeping lest you wake a workman sleeping mix me with your grief boys and girls that steal walking laughter of the old to kneel by a dripping raptor under the discolored eaves out of trunks with hingeless covers lifting tales of saints and lovers, travelers, goblins, thieves sons that shine by night mountains made from valleys bare me to the light flat upon your bellies by the webby window lie where the little flies are crawling read me margin me with squalling do not let me die sexton, ply your trade in a shower of gravel stamp upon your spade many a row shall ravel many a metal wreath shall rust in the rain and I go singing through the lots where you are flinging yellow clay on dust end of poem this recording is in the public domain alms my heart is what it was before a house where people come and go but it is winter with your love the sashes are beset with snow I light the lamp and lay the cloth I blow the coals to blaze again but it is winter with your love the frost is thick upon the pain I know a winter when it comes the leaves are listless on the boughs I watched your love a little while and brought my plants into the house I water them and turn them south I snap the dead brown from the stem but it is winter with your love I only tend and water them there was a time I stood and watched the small ill-natured sparrows fray I loved the beggar that I fed I cared for what he had to say I stood and watched him out of sight today I reach around the door and set a bowl upon the step my heart is what it was before but it is winter with your love I scatter crumbs upon the sill and close the window and the birds may take or leave them as they will end a poem this recording is in the public domain Inland by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibriVox.org by Neema Inland people that build their houses inland people that buy a plot of ground shaped like a house and build a house there far from the seaboard far from the sound of water sucking the hollow ledges tons of water striking the shore what do they long for as I long for one salt smell of the sea once more people the waves have not awakened spanking the boats at the harbour's head what do they long for as I long for starting up in my inland bed beating the narrow walls and finding neither a window nor a door screaming to God for death by drowning one salt taste of the sea once more end a poem this recording is in the public domain to a poet that died young by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibriVox.org by Neema to a poet that died young Minstrel what have you to do with this man that walked to you sharing not your happy fate sat his England's laureate vainly in these iron days strives the poet in your praise Minstrel by whose singing sighed beauty walked until you died still though none should hark again drones the blue fly in the pain thickly crust the blackest moss blows the rose its musk across floats the boat that is forgot none the less to Camelot many abards untimely death lends unto his verses breath hears a song was never sung growing old is dying young Minstrel what is this to you that a man you never knew when your grave was far in green sat and gossiped with a queen failure knows how rare a thing is it to grow old and sing when the brown and tepid tide closes in on every side who shall say if Shelly's gold had withstood it to grow old and a poem this recording is in the public domain Wraith by Edna St. Vincent Millay read her LibreVox.org by Nima Wraith thin rain whom are you haunting that you haunt my door surely it is not I she's wanting someone living here before nobody's in the house but me you may come in if you like and see thin is thread with exquisite fingers have you seen her any of you gray shawl and leaning on the wind and the garden showing through glimmering eyes and silent mostly sort of a whisper sort of a purr asking something asking it over if you get a sound from her ever see her any of you strangest thing I've ever known every night since I moved in and I came to be alone thin rain hush with your knocking you may not come in this is I that you hear rocking nobody's with me nor has been curious how she tried the window odd the way she tries the door wonder just what sort of people could have had this house before and a poem this recording is in the public domain Ebb by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibraVox.org by Larry Wilson 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 drawing inward from the edge end of poem this recording is in the public domain Elaine by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibraVox.org by Bruce Kachuk Oh come again to Astolat I will not ask you to be kind and you may go when you will go and I will stay behind I will not say how dear you are or ask you if you hold me dear or trouble you with things for you that you did last year so still the orchard lands a lot so very still the lake shall be you could not guess though you should guess what has become of me so wide shall be the garden walk the garden seat so very wide you needs must think if you should think the lily maid had died a little way away I'd watch you for a little while to see you speak the way you speak and smile if you should smile end of poem this recording is in the public domain burial by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibraVox.org by Bruce Kachuk mine is a body that should die at sea and have for a grave instead of a grave six feet deep and the length of me all the water that is under the wave and terrible fishes to seize my flesh such as a living man might fear and eat me while I am firm and fresh not wait till I've been dead for a year end of poem this recording is in the public domain Mariposa by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibraVox.org by Nima Mariposa Butterflies are white and blue in this field we wander through suffer me to take your hand death comes in a day or two all the things we ever knew will be ashes in that hour mark the transient butterfly how he hangs upon the flower suffer me to take your hand suffer me to cherish you till the dawn is in the sky whether I be false or true death comes in a day or two end of poem this recording is in the public domain doubt no more that Oberon by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibraVox.org by Josh Kibbey doubt no more that Oberon never doubt that Pan lived and played a reed and ran after nymphs in a dark forest in the merry credulous days lived and led a fairy band over the indulgent land ha ha ha for in this dourist sourced age man's eye has looked upon death to fawns and death to phase still the dogwood dares to raise healthy tree with trunk and root ivory bowls that bear no fruit and the starlings in the jays birds that cannot even sing dare to come again in spring end of poem this recording is in the public domain lament by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibraVox.org by Bruce Kachuk listen children your father is dead from his old coats I'll make you little jackets I'll make you little trousers from his old pants there be in his pockets things he used to put there keys and pennies covered with tobacco Dan shall have the pennies to save in his bank and shall have the keys to make a pretty noise with life must go on and the dead be forgotten life must go on though good men die and eat your breakfast Dan take your medicine life must go on I forget just why end of poem this recording is in the public domain Exiled by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibraVox.org by Nima Exiled searching my heart for its true sorrow this is the thing I find to be that I am weary of words and people sick of the city wanting the sea wanting the sticky salty sweetness of the strong wind of the sea wanting the salty sweetness of the strong wind and shattered spray wanting the loud sound and the soft sound of the big surf that breaks all day always before about my door yard marking the reach of the winter sea rooted in sand and dragging driftwood struggled the purple wild sweet pea always I climbed the wave at morning shook the sand for my shoes at night now I'm caught beneath great buildings stricken with noise confused with light if I could hear the green piles groaning under the windy wooden piers see once again the bobbing barrels and the black sticks that fence their wears if I could see the weedy muscles crusting the rectin rotting halls hear once again the hungry crying overhead of the wheeling galls feel once again the shanty straining under the turning of the tide fear once again the rising fresh it dread the bell and the fog outside I should be happy that was happy all day long on the coast of Maine I have a need to hold and handle shells and anchors and ships again I should be happy that I'm happy never at all and here I am too long away from water I have a need of water near and a poem this recording is in the public domain The Deaths of Autumn by Edna St Vincent Millay read for LibreFox.org by phone when reeds are dead and a straw detached a marshes and feathered Pampas grass rides into the wind the aged warrior is westward tragic, thinned of half their time and over the flattened rushes stripped of its secret open, stark and bleak black and safar the half-forgotten creek then leans on me the weight of the year and crushes my heart I know that beauty must ale and die and will be born again to see beauty stiffened staring up at the sky oh autumn autumn what is the spring to me and the poem this recording is in the public domain Ode to Silence by Edna St Vincent Millay read for LibreFox.org by Larry Wilson I bet she your other sister and my other soul grave silence lovelier than the three loveliest maidens what of her Cleo, not you not you, Calliope nor all your wanton line not beauty's perfect self shall comfort me for silence once departed for her the cool tongue her the tranquil hearted whomever more I follow willfully wandering heaven and earth and hell and the four seasons through Thalia, not you but not you not you, Melpimini not your incomparable feet, O thin Terpsicle I seek in this great hall but one more pale more pensive, most beloved of you all I seek her from afar I come from temples where her altars are from groves that bear her name noisy with stricken victims now in sacrificial flame and symbols struck on high and strident faces in her caress in her praise they neither love nor know a goddess of gone days departed long ago abandoning the invaded shrines and fanes of her old sanctuary a deity obscured and legendary of whom there now remains for sages to decipher and priests to garble only and for a little while her letters wedged in marble which even now behold the friendly mumbling rain erases in articulate snow leaving at last of her least signs and traces none whatsoever nor whither she has vanished from these places she will love well, I said if love be of that heart inhabitor the flowers of the dead the red anemone that with no sound moves in the wind and from another wound that sprang the heavily sweet blue hyacinth that blossoms underground and sallow poppies will be dear to her and will not silence no in the black shade of what obsidian steep stiffens the white narcissus numb with sleep seed which dimeter's daughter bore from home uptorn by desperate fingers long ago reluctant even as she undone Persephone and even as she set out again to grow and twilight in perditions lean and inauspicious loam she will love well, I said the flowers of the dead where dark Persephone the winter round uncomforted for home uncomforted lacking a sunny southern slope in northern Sicily with solemn pupils focused on a dream stares on the stagnant stream that moats the unequivocal battlements of hell there, there will she be found she that his beauty veiled from men and music in a swound I long for silence as they long for breath whose helpless nostrils drink the bitter seed what thing can be so stout what's so redoubtable in death what fury, what considerable rage if only she upon whose icy breast unquestioned and caressed one time I lay and whom always I lack even to this day being by no means from that frigid bosom weaned away if only she therewith be given me back I sought her down the Dolores labyrinth wherein no shaft of sunlight ever fell and in among the bloodless everywhere I sought her but the air breathed many times and spent was fretful with a whispering discontent and questioning me importuning me to tell some slightest tidings of the light of day they know no more plucking my sleeve the eager shades with me where I went I paused at every grievous door and harked a moment holding up my hand and for a space a hush was on them while they watched my face and then they fell a whisperiness before so that I smiled at them and left them seeing she was not there I sought her too among the upper gods although I knew she was not like to be where feasting is to heaven's lord being a thing aboard and shunned of him although a child of his not yours not yours to you she owes not breath mother of song being sown of Zeus upon a dream of death fearing to pass and visited some place and later learned too late how all the while with her still face she had been standing there and seen me pass without a smile I sought her even to the sagging board where at the stout immortal sat but such a laughter shook the mighty hall no one could hear me say had she been seen upon the hill that day and no one knew at all how long I stood or when at last I sighed and went away there is a garden lying in a lull between the mountains and the mountainous sea I know not where but which a dream and a place on my lids a moment till the hall be lifted from the kernel and slumber fed to me your footprint is not there nemesini though it would seem a ruined place and after your likeness hard to being full of broken columns chariades thrown to the earth and fallen forward on their jointless knees and urns funerial altered into dust by neuter than the ashes of the dead and psyches lamp out of the earth up thrust dripping itself in marble wax on what was once the bed of love and his young body asleep but now as dust instead there twist the bittersweet the white wisteria fastens its fingers in the strangling wall and the wide crannies quicken with bright wings there dumbly like a worm all day the still white orchid feeds but never an echo of your daughter's laughter is there nor any sign of you at all swells fungus from the rotten bow gray mother apiaria only her shadow once upon a stone I saw and lo the shadow and the garden too were gone I tell you you have done her body and ill you chatterers you noisy crew she is not anywhere I sought her in deep hell and through the world as well I thought of heaven and I sought her there above nor underground is silence to be found that was the very warp and woof of you lovely before your songs began and after they were through oh say if on this hill somewhere your sister's body lies in death so I may follow there and make a wreath of my locked hands that on her quiet breast shall lie till age has withered them ah sweetly from the rest I see turn and consider me compassionate uterpy there is a gate beyond the gate of death beyond the gate of everlasting life beyond the gates of heaven and hell she said where upon but to believe is horror where on to meditate in gendrith even in deathless spirit such as I the tumult in the breath a chilling of the inexhaustible blood even in my veins that never will be dry and in the austere divine monotony that is my being the madness of an unaccustomed mood this is her province whom you lack and seek and seek her not elsewhere hell is a thoroughfare for pilgrims heracles for he that loved your DC too well have walked therein and many more than these and witness the desire and the despair souls that passed reluctantly and sickened for the air you too have entered hell and issued thence the thence whereof I speak none has returned for thither fury brings only the driven ghosts of them that flee before all things oblivion is the name of this abode as she is there oh radiant song oh gracious memory belong upon this height I shall not climb again I know the way you mean the little night in the long empty day never to see again the angry light for hear the hungry noises cry my brain ah but she your other sister in my other soul she shall again be mine and I shall drink her from a silver bowl a chilly thin green wine not bitter to the taste not sweet not of your press oh restless clamorous nine to foam beneath the frantic hoofs of mirth savoring faintly of the acid earth and trod by pensive feet from perfect clusters ripened without haste out of the urgent heat in some clear glimmering vaulted twilight under the odorous vine lift up your liars sing on but is for me I seek your sister whether she is gone end of poem this recording is in the public domain memorial to DC by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibriVox.org by Bruce Gachuk Vassar College 1918 oh loveliest throat of all sweet throats where now no more the music is with hands that wrote you little notes I write you little allergies end of poem this recording is in the public domain sonnets one through six by Edna St. Vincent Millay read for LibriVox.org by Eva Davis 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 these subtle weeds no man has need to tend harsh 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 meager passion here with lovers such as we for ever more a soul that drinks the draft and Guinevere receives the tables ruin through her door with the loud surf at her ear let's fall the colored book upon the floor into the golden vessel of great song let us pour all our passion breast to breast let other lovers lie in love and rest not we articulate so but with the tongue of all the world the churning blood the long shuddering quiet the desperate palms pressed sharply together upon the escaping guest the common soul unguarded and grown strong longing alone is singer to the loot let's still un-nuddles in the open sigh the minstrel that in slumber is as mute as any man and love be far and high that else forsakes the topmost branch bound on the ground by every passerby not with libations but with shouts and laughter we drench the altars of love's sacred grove shaking to earth green fruits impatient after the launching of the colored maws of love love's proper myrtle and his mother's zone we bound about our irreligious brows and fettered him with garlands and spread a banquet in his frugal house not yet the god has spoken but I fear though we should break our bodies in his flame and pour our blood upon his altar here hence forward is a grove without a name a pasture to the shaggy goats a pan whence flee forever a woman and a man only until this cigarette extended a little moment at the end of all while on the floor the quiet ashes fall and in the firelight to a lance extended bizarrely with the jazzing music blended the broken shadow dances on the wall I will permit my memory to recall the vision of you by all my dreams attended and then farewell the dream is done yours is a face of which I can forget the color and the features everyone the words not ever and the smiles not yet but in your day this moment is the sun upon a hill after the sun has set once more into my arid days like dew like wind from an oasis or the sound of cold sweet water bubbling underground a treacherous messenger the thought of you comes to destroy me once more I renew firm faith in your abundance whom I found long since to be but just one other mound of sand where on no green thing ever grew and once again and wiser in no wise I chase your colored phantom on the air and sob and curse and fall and weep and rise and stumble pitifully on to where miserable and lost with stinging eyes once more I clasp and there is nothing there no rose that in a garden ever grew in homers or in toomars or in mine though buried under centuries in dead dust of roses shut from sun and dew forever and forever lost from view but must again in fragrance riches whine the gray aisles of the air in carnodyne when the old summers surge into anew thus when I swear I love with all my heart tis with the heart of Lilith that I swear tis with the love of Lesbia and Lucrice and thus as well my love must lose some part of what it is had Helen been less fair or perished young or stayed at home in Greece End of poem. This recording is in the public domain. I turn away reluctant from your light and stand a resolute a mind undone a silly, dazzled thing deprived of sight from having looked too long upon the sun then is my daily life a narrow room in which a little while uncertainly, surrounded by impenetrable gloom among familiar things grown strange to me making my way I turn away reluctant from your light and stand a resolute a mind undone among familiar things grown strange to me making my way I pause and feel and hark till I become accustomed to the dark 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 of death or under his autumnal frost shall be as any leaf that fell this wonder fled altered, estranged disintegrated lost nor shall my love avail you in your hour in spite of all my love you will arise upon that day and wander down the air obscurely as the unattended flower it mattering not how beautiful you were or how beloved above all else that dies let you not say of me when I am old in pretty worship of my withered hands forgetting who I am and how the sands of such a life as mine run red and gold even to the ultimate sifting dust behold here walketh passionless age for there expands a curious superstition in these lands and by its leaves some weightless tales are told in me no linten wicks watch out the night I am the booth where folly holds your fair and pious no less in ruin than in strength when I lie crumble to the earth at length let you not say upon this revered sight the righteous groaned and beat their breasts in prayer oh my beloved have you thought of this how in the years to come unscrupulous time more cruel than death will tear you from my kiss and make you old and leave me in my prime how you and I who scale together yet a little while sweet immortal height no pilgrim may remember or forget as sure as the world turns some granite night shall lie awake and know the gracious flame gone out forever on the mutual stone and call to mind how on the day you came I was a child and you a hero groan and the night pass and the strange morning break upon our anguish for each other's sake as to some lovely temple tenantless long since so sweet with shivering brass knowing well it's alters ruined and the grass grown up between the stones yet from excess of grease hard driven or great loneliness the worshipper returns and those who pass marvel him crying on a name that was so is it now with me in my distress your body was a temple to delight cold art's ashes once the breath is fled yet here one time your spirit was want 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 cherish you then the hope I shall forget at length my lord peria put away for your so passing sake this month of clay these mortal bones against my body set for all the puny fever and frail sweat of human love renounce for these I say the singing mountains memory and betray the silent leer that hangs upon me yet ah but indeed some day shall you awake rather from dreams of me that at your side so many nights a lover and a bride but stern in my soul's chastity have lain to walk the world forever for my sake and in each chamber find me gone again end of poems this recording is in the public domain Wild Swans by Edna St. Vincent Malay read for LibriVox.org by Larry Wilson I looked in my heart while the wild swans went over and what did I see I had not seen before only a question less or a question more nothing to match the flight of wild birds flying tiresome heart forever living and dying house without air I leave you and lock your door Wild Swans come over the town come over the town again trailing your legs and crying end of poem this recording is in the public domain end of poems by Edna St. Vincent Malay