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First Fig and Other Poems
From the bohemian outpost of Greenwich Village during the Jazz Age, Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892–1950) sounded a clarion call for the impassioned youth of her generation. Her rare mixture of clever cynicism and wistful tenderness captivated readers, who reveled in the jubilant defiance of such poems as the title piece of this collection, "First Fig": "My candle burns at both ends;/It will not last the night;/But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends — /it gives a lovely light!"
Their brilliance undimmed by the passage of time, these gemlike verses continue to dazzle poetry lovers. This new anthology represents the quintessential Edna St. Vincent Millay, comprising 67 poems from two of her most popular works, A Few Figs from Thistles and Second April . Its contents include such well-known and much-studied poems as "Recuerdo" and "The Philosopher," along with an abundance of sonnets, a genre in which the Pulitzer Prize–winning poet excelled.
The perfect introduction for those as yet unacquainted with one of the most distinctive voices of 20th-century poetry, this volume also offers a high-quality, inexpensive treasury of favorite Millay works for devotees of her verse.
Their brilliance undimmed by the passage of time, these gemlike verses continue to dazzle poetry lovers. This new anthology represents the quintessential Edna St. Vincent Millay, comprising 67 poems from two of her most popular works, A Few Figs from Thistles and Second April . Its contents include such well-known and much-studied poems as "Recuerdo" and "The Philosopher," along with an abundance of sonnets, a genre in which the Pulitzer Prize–winning poet excelled.
The perfect introduction for those as yet unacquainted with one of the most distinctive voices of 20th-century poetry, this volume also offers a high-quality, inexpensive treasury of favorite Millay works for devotees of her verse.
50 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1921
21 people are currently reading
158 people want to read
About the author
Edna St. Vincent Millay
439 books1,091 followersEdna St. Vincent Millay was an American lyrical poet and playwright. She received the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1923, the third woman to win the award for poetry, and was also known for her feminist activism and her many love affairs. She used the pseudonym Nancy Boyd for her prose work.
This famous portrait of Vincent (as she was called by friends) was taken by Carl Van Vechten in 1933.
This famous portrait of Vincent (as she was called by friends) was taken by Carl Van Vechten in 1933.
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
May 15, 2007
IV
Only until this cigarette is ended,
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 adieu,--farewell!--the dream is done.
Yours is a face of which I can forget
The color and the features, every one,
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.
Only until this cigarette is ended,
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 adieu,--farewell!--the dream is done.
Yours is a face of which I can forget
The color and the features, every one,
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.
August 5, 2015
When I was in middle school--or junior high, as we called it then--a hated English teacher made us all miss an event that most of us wanted to be part of, in order to study Edna St. Vincent Millay, thus setting me dead against both of them for decades after. What an old lady name anyway, she couldn't possibly have anything to say to me! Well....wrong.
I am grateful that I finally gave Edna a chance after a friend introduced me to her poem "Recuerdo." Old lady my eye, here was a passionate soul! Her poems are full to the brim with desire, an eye for nature, the desire to get up and go, love who she might, and make gorgeous poetry out of all of it, even the regrets. My favorites here, besides "Recuerdo" were "Spring", "Song of a Second Spring", "Prayer To Persephone" and the light-hearted "The Bean-Stalk." The only poem I didn't like at all was the lengthy and --to me at least--dull "Ode To Silence", which read like a roll-call of mythological figures, all to no very thrilling point. The rest? Amazing.
But wait, there's more! I've never particularly been a fan of the sonnet form...until now. Millay was an acknowledged master at it, and after reading hers--and there are many in this volume--I'm converted. I read them all multiple times, first for the emotion and meaning, and then again to see how she did it, complete with margin notes. Hey, she told me it was okay. In the included poem "The Poet and His Book", she writes "Read me, margin me with scrawling", and so I did. I did!
I am so glad I gave her poetry a chance, despite Mrs. Griffith of middle school infamy. The whole book was a joy and a revelation. Here is an unconventional woman who could write the most conventional forms in such a way as to set them on fire with her words. Very much recommended.
I am grateful that I finally gave Edna a chance after a friend introduced me to her poem "Recuerdo." Old lady my eye, here was a passionate soul! Her poems are full to the brim with desire, an eye for nature, the desire to get up and go, love who she might, and make gorgeous poetry out of all of it, even the regrets. My favorites here, besides "Recuerdo" were "Spring", "Song of a Second Spring", "Prayer To Persephone" and the light-hearted "The Bean-Stalk." The only poem I didn't like at all was the lengthy and --to me at least--dull "Ode To Silence", which read like a roll-call of mythological figures, all to no very thrilling point. The rest? Amazing.
But wait, there's more! I've never particularly been a fan of the sonnet form...until now. Millay was an acknowledged master at it, and after reading hers--and there are many in this volume--I'm converted. I read them all multiple times, first for the emotion and meaning, and then again to see how she did it, complete with margin notes. Hey, she told me it was okay. In the included poem "The Poet and His Book", she writes "Read me, margin me with scrawling", and so I did. I did!
I am so glad I gave her poetry a chance, despite Mrs. Griffith of middle school infamy. The whole book was a joy and a revelation. Here is an unconventional woman who could write the most conventional forms in such a way as to set them on fire with her words. Very much recommended.
June 17, 2025
Marvellous book! This is the first work I have read from Edna St Vincent Millay and I am determined to read all of her other works. I loved most of her poems, and liked others, and fortunately, I didn’t dislike any of them. I read some of her poems more than once. I had to savour them. Here one of my favourites! I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!
THE POET AND HIS BOOK
Down, you mongrel, Death!
Back into your kennel!
I hove 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 am I that lie thereunder,
Hidden from the moon?
This my personal death?–
That my lungs be failing
To inhale the breath
Others are exhaling?
This my subtle spirit's end?–
Ah, when the thawed winter splashes
Over these chance dust and ashes,
Weep not me, my friend!
Me, by no means dead
In that hour, but surely
When this book, unread,
Rots to earth obscurely,
And no more to any breast,
Close against the clamorous swelling
Of the thing there is no telling,
Are these pages pressed!
When this book is mould,
And a book of many
Waiting to be sold
For a casual penny,
In a little open case,
In a street unclean and cluttered,
Where a heavy mud is spattered
From the passing drays,
Stranger, pause and look;
From 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 lie
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 at your raking,
When the sun is high,
While the hay is making,
When, along the stubble strewn,
Withering on their stalks uneaten,
Strawberries turn dark and sweeten
In the lapse 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,–
If an old song 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 boil,
Snatch of me your pleasure,
Where the broom-straw marks the leaf;
Women quiet with your weeping
Lest you wake a workman sleeping,
Mix me with your grief !
Boys and girls that steal
From the shocking laughter
Of the old, to kneel
By a dripping rafter
Under the discolored eaves,
Out of trunks with hingeless covers
Lifting tales of saints and lovers,
Travelers, goblins, thieves,
Suns that shine by night,
Mountains made from valleys,–
Bear me to the light,
Flat upon your bellies
By the webby window lie,
Where the little flies are crawling,–
Read me, margin me with scrawling,
Do not let me die !
Sexton, ply your trade!
In a shower of gravel
Stamp upon your spade!
Many a rose 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!
THE POET AND HIS BOOK
Down, you mongrel, Death!
Back into your kennel!
I hove 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 am I that lie thereunder,
Hidden from the moon?
This my personal death?–
That my lungs be failing
To inhale the breath
Others are exhaling?
This my subtle spirit's end?–
Ah, when the thawed winter splashes
Over these chance dust and ashes,
Weep not me, my friend!
Me, by no means dead
In that hour, but surely
When this book, unread,
Rots to earth obscurely,
And no more to any breast,
Close against the clamorous swelling
Of the thing there is no telling,
Are these pages pressed!
When this book is mould,
And a book of many
Waiting to be sold
For a casual penny,
In a little open case,
In a street unclean and cluttered,
Where a heavy mud is spattered
From the passing drays,
Stranger, pause and look;
From 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 lie
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 at your raking,
When the sun is high,
While the hay is making,
When, along the stubble strewn,
Withering on their stalks uneaten,
Strawberries turn dark and sweeten
In the lapse 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,–
If an old song 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 boil,
Snatch of me your pleasure,
Where the broom-straw marks the leaf;
Women quiet with your weeping
Lest you wake a workman sleeping,
Mix me with your grief !
Boys and girls that steal
From the shocking laughter
Of the old, to kneel
By a dripping rafter
Under the discolored eaves,
Out of trunks with hingeless covers
Lifting tales of saints and lovers,
Travelers, goblins, thieves,
Suns that shine by night,
Mountains made from valleys,–
Bear me to the light,
Flat upon your bellies
By the webby window lie,
Where the little flies are crawling,–
Read me, margin me with scrawling,
Do not let me die !
Sexton, ply your trade!
In a shower of gravel
Stamp upon your spade!
Many a rose 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!
February 24, 2018
2.5 stars. So disappointed with this collection. Other than "First Fig" which is a work of genius, I couldn't find more than 2 or 3 poems that appealed to me even slightly. Most of them were VERY long, rambling poems that seemed to be mostly about weeds and/or thistles. I am willing to concede that the poem's shortcomings exist from my end and not the poet's, but they were just indecipherable and...boring.
September 1, 2025
I don't typically read lyrical poetry, but I enjoyed this a lot.
July 5, 2013
I like the 'Second April' poems more than the 'A Few Figs from Thistles' collection. The 'Second April' part is richer emotionally and lyrically more developed. This Dover edition contains all of the poems from those two originally separate collections.
December 20, 2017
First Fig drives you to live your life the way you want to.
EL. 17.
EL. 17.
May 3, 2022
incredible as always with Edna, good to read in mourning april:
“When I too long have looked upon your face,
Wherein for me a brightness unobscured
Save by the mists of brightness has its place,
And terrible beauty not to be endured,
I turn away reluctant from your light,
And stand irresolute, 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 pause, and feel, and hark,
Till I become accustomed to the dark.”
“When I too long have looked upon your face,
Wherein for me a brightness unobscured
Save by the mists of brightness has its place,
And terrible beauty not to be endured,
I turn away reluctant from your light,
And stand irresolute, 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 pause, and feel, and hark,
Till I become accustomed to the dark.”
November 14, 2023
„The young girl from Camden, Maine, became famous through not receiving the price“. Millay, a self-proclaimed bisexual and one of my favourite poets in history. Not only for her bisexual representation but her feminist works as well. „Many of the poems seemed to advocate the same kind of sexual freedom for women that men already enjoyed“. Also, just look at this piece of art (an extract of the poem ‚travel‘):
“My 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 it’s going.”
“My 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 it’s going.”
May 24, 2022
I am hesitant about reading poetry because it is so personal and varying. At first I did not think I was going to like this, but as I read on I was surprised to find poems that snuck up on me and surprised me with their intensity, especially the particularly short poems. Definitely worth every read at a later date.
April 9, 2025
Liked some of the poems but didn’t feel any thing deeply
But liked that some was lana themed
And others were greek
More about persephone and i liked it cause i knew the story
I liked the second fig poem and she is overheard singing, spring poem
Journey
…and more
But liked that some was lana themed
And others were greek
More about persephone and i liked it cause i knew the story
I liked the second fig poem and she is overheard singing, spring poem
Journey
…and more
August 12, 2018
Really just was not into it.
April 1, 2021
I only liked 3 of the 50ish poems - first fig, second fig and mariposa. The rest were ok, not horrible
May 18, 2024
what a POET!
Read
July 14, 2024the titular poem "First Fig" is really great:
My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light!
My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light!
August 6, 2024
normally i love poetry and prose but some of this was SO long
September 24, 2025
“My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light!”
- A life of passion is a life well lived
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light!”
- A life of passion is a life well lived
December 26, 2020
Edna St. Vincent Millay has been my favorite poet since I was 10 when I discovered her poem "Afternoon on a Hill" for a poetry project in 5th grade. It's short, sweet, and easy to remember. This collection of poems beautifully recreates the same joy I experienced. Millay brings out the magic of the mundane with her style and content which can be seen in my favorite from this collection "The Unexplorer."
November 14, 2011
"What should I be but a prophet and a liar, whose mother was a leprechaun, whose father was a friar? Tethed on a crucifix and cradled under water, what should I be but the fiend's god-daughter?"
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews