The Courage That My Mother Had

"Renascence" by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1912)

Millay’s first major success was “Renascence,” a lyric poem clocking in at more than 200 lines, published to high acclaim in 1912. The poem had enormous success and reach, showing up in schoolrooms across the country as an example of American verse. Poet Hannah Brooks-Motl notes that in the poem, “Millay explores the limits of individual perception while gesturing toward poetry’s ability to permeate the consciousness of others, to infiltrate, possess, or alter how any one person perceives the world, even if only momentarily” (Brooks-Motl, Hannah. “Edna St. Vincent Millay: Renascence.” 2015. Poetry Foundation). Upon graduating from Vassar in 1917, Millay republished this poem in her first collection, Renascence and Other Poems.

"What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why" by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1920)

This oft-anthologized poem, published in Vanity Fair in 1920, is Millay using the sonnet form for which she became most famous. Though the poem’s beginning signals romance, Millay soon deviates from this expected topic; instead her speaker cannot remember her lovers, and expresses regret over her experiences. The poem ends on a note of despair, as the speaker notes, “I cannot say what loves have come and gone, / I only know that summer sang in me / A little while, that in me sings no more” (Lines 12-14). “What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,” foregrounds a woman’s interiority, deviating from expectations that women’s experiences of love and romance should be passive. Alicia Ostriker argues that the poem traces an adult life, as its speaker is at all times aware of her mortality: Her experience begins as “birdsong, then becomes summer itself, that fructifying force felt by the poet as music, then fades to black” (Ostriker, Alicia. “‘Renascence’: Edna St. Vincent Millay Today.” Poets.org, Academy of American Poets).

"Figs from Thistles: First Fig" by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1920)

This four line poem from Millay’s 1920 eponymous collection epitomizes the playful tone of the book, and her presentation of women as figures of sexual agency—a new feature in poetry. Carl Van Doren compared Millay’s lyric poetry to that of Sappho, an ancient Greek lyric poet, since both were women writing “outspokenly” (Van Doren, Carl. “Edna St. Vincent Millay.” Poetry Foundation).