I didn’t go off and look at porn after all. I mean, who would do such a thing on a special day like today, a day dedicated to love, not sex? Philistines. No, instead of rushing off to my standing date with porn, I went off with a big bag of Necco sweethearts, a bottle of Bull’s Blood, and a book of sonnets from one of my favorite sonneteers, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and bawled my eyes out. I mean, it is Valentine’s Day, after all. And it’s impossible, when you think of love, not to think of Millay’s sonnets, isn’t it? Sure, some prefer Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s “How do I love thee,” and blabidee-blah. Personally I’m not all that interested in the body count. But I’ll admit Browning is more appropriate than Millay. Browning is a Romance poet, and Valentine’s Day is steeped in the Romantic’s notion of love, although the tragedy has been wrung out of it for the most part. That’s the wee problem with it, in fact. Romance with a happy ending can hardly be called Romantic at all, can it? Even Browning’s sonnet ends “and, if God choose,/I shall but love thee better after death.” But, details, details. The thoroughly modern Millay puts it all in perspective, that’s for sure. (For some others who do, check out Former Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky’s list here.)
Anyway, it’s a pity sonnets don’t fit on your average Necco sweetheart. Guess we’ll just have to settle for “fax me” instead.
Here are four from Millay’s 1920 collection, A Few Figs From Thistles. Jot one down in your sweety’s V-Day card, if you dare.
I
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: thick about my hair
Day in, day out, your ominous arrows purr
Who still am free, unto no querulous care
A fool, and in no temple worshiper!
I, that have bared me to your quiver’s fire,
Lifted my face into its puny rain,
Do wreathe you Impotent to Evoke Desire
As you are Powerless to Elicit Pain!
(Now will the god, for blasphemy so brave,
Punish me, surely, with the shaft I crave!)
II
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 won you to me, and beneath your gaze,
Naked of reticence 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,
Cherish no less the certain stakes I gained,
And walk your memory’s halls, austere, supreme,
A ghost in marble of a girl you knew
Who would have loved you in a day or two.
III
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 to 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 inconstant is no care:
I have but to continue at your side.
So wanton, light and false, my love, are you,
I am most faithless when I most am true.
IV
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 forever; 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 oaths 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.
