Wanted to find out a bit about style, since we have been working on the house a bit.
The book was good to learn a bit of the basics. It was an interesting read too. The author included some really revealing pieces of her own life that really added to the reading experience. I can see why the book and blog are popular.
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
I know I am but summer to your heart, And not the full four seasons of the year; And you must welcome from another part Such noble moods as are not mine, my dear. No gracious weight of golden fruits to sell Have I, nor any wise and wintry thing; And I have loved you all too long and well To carry still the high sweet breast of Spring. Wherefore I say: O love, as summer goes, I must be gone, steal forth with silent drums, That you may hail anew the bird and rose When I come back to you, as summer comes. Else will you seek, at some not distant time, Even your summer in another clime.
First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do. – Epictetus
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Here is a wound that never will heal, I know, Being wrought not of a dearness and a death, But of a love turned ashes and the breath Gone out of beauty; never again will grow The grass on that scarred acre, though I sow Young seed there yearly and the sky bequeath Its friendly weathers down, far Underneath Shall be such bitterness of an old woe. That April should be shattered by a gust, That August should be levelled by a rain, I can endure, and that the lifted dust Of man should settle to the earth again; But that a dream can die, will be a thrust Between my ribs forever of hot pain.
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Hearing your words, and not a word among them Tuned to my liking, on a salty day When inland woods were pushed by winds that flung them Hissing to leeward like a ton of spray, I thought how off Matinicus the tide Came pounding in, came running through the Gut, While from the Rock the warning whistle cried, And children whimpered, and the doors blew shut; There in the autumn when the men go forth, With slapping skirts the island women stand In gardens stripped and scattered, peering north, With dahlia tubers dripping from the hand: The wind of their endurance, driving south, Flattened your words against your speaking mouth.
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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?
Rolling Stone, or course, was a culturally important magazine, but more importantly, it was very important to me. I used to checkout dozens of back issues from the library when I was a teenager. It certainly had a major impact on me.
Fun read, fantastic pictures.
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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.
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Boys and girls that held her dear, Do your weeping now; All you loved of her lies here. Brought to earth the arrogant brow, And the withering tongue Chastened; do your weeping now. Sing whatever songs are sung, Wind whatever wreath, For a playmate perished young, For a spirit spent in death. Boys and girls that held her dear, All you loved of her lies here.
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
It's little I care what path I take, And where it leads it's little I care; But out of this house, lest my heart break, I must go, and off somewhere. It's little I know what's in my heart, What's in my mind it's little I know, But there's that in me must up and start, And it's little I care where my feet go. I wish I could walk for a day and a night, And find me at dawn in a desolate place With never the rut of a road in sight, Nor the roof of a house, nor the eyes of a face. I wish I could walk till my blood should spout, And drop me, never to stir again, On a shore that is wide, for the tide is out, And the weedy rocks are bare to the rain. But dump or dock, where the path I take Brings up, it's little enough I care; And it's little I'd mind the fuss they'll make, Huddled dead in a ditch somewhere. "Is something the matter, dear," she said, "That you sit at your work so silently?" "No, mother, no, 'twas a knot in my thread. There goes the kettle, I'll make the tea."