Second April

The Hero Returns (Paperback) #7

by Edna St. Vincent Millay

A sweeping collection of vivid poems that explore love, loss, and the natural world through Millay's daring voice.

Edna St. Vincent Millay’s Second April gathers a diverse set of lyric poems that drift from intimate longing to expansive, world-grasping scenes. The voices shift across moods and settings, inviting readers to feel the ache of memory, the beauty of the ordinary, and the quiet awe of nature. This edition presents rough seas and quiet gardens alike, offering a wide window into Millay’s poetic imagination.


Experience shifting tones from elegy and lament to passionate ardor and playful fantasy.
Encounter recurring themes of love, death, faith, and the pull of the sea and coast.
Move through intimate personal verses and broader, almost mythic moments.
Accessible, melodic language that rewards rereading and reflection.


Ideal for readers who enjoy classic American poetry with a fearless, musical voice that speaks to emotion and memory alike.

Genres: Poetry, 20th Century, Classics, American, The United States Of America, Ebooks

124 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1921

About the author

Edna 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.

Reviews

[Ilse]

Wild Swans

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!



Group IX/SUW, No. 1. The Swan, No.1, by Hilma af Klint.

[Vesna]

Millay's third collection, published just a year after her A Few Figs from Thistles: Poems and Sonnets and just as beautiful in the music of her rhythm and rhymes. She again also composes in an impressive range of poetic forms, from elegies to sonnets. Thematically though it's quite different, this time filled with lament for the dead, love disappointments, unfulfilled dreams.

The collection title is deceptive if one expects that it celebrates the rebirth and new life heralded by spring, it's anything but... It is dedicated to her friend from college who died young in the flu pandemic and there is a poignant section MEMORIAL TO D. C. [VASSAR COLLEGE, 1918] with an homage in 6 poetic forms traditionally honoring the dead (elegy, epitaph, dirge ...). There are also echoes of remembrances of many fallen lives in World War I as when the leading poem SPRING, takes a dark turn:

Not only under ground are the brains of men
Eaten by maggots.
Life in itself
Is nothing, ...

from THE POET AND HIS BOOK:

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!

from TO A POET THAT DIED YOUNG:

Many a bard 's untimely death
Lends unto his verses breath ;
Here 's a song was never sung :
Growing old is dying young.

TRAVEL

The railroad 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.

All 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.

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.

[Theo Logos]

Second April is a volume of beautiful melancholy. Millay uses a number of poetic forms to set the vibrant world of beauty against the reality of death and loss. In the first line of her first poem, Spring, she challenges the very idea of life renewal -

To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Beauty is not enough.

And closes the poem with -

It is not enough that, yearly, down this hill,
April
Comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers.

In Passer Mortuus Est she extends her theme of death to a relationship that has failed -

After all, my erstwhile dear,
My no longer cherished,
Need we say it was not love,
Now that love is perished?

And in The Death of Autumn Millay finally renounces the season of renewal altogether, praising the stark beauty of death -

Then leans on me the weight of the year, and
crushes
My heart. I know that beauty must ail and
die,
And will be born again, - but ah, to see
Beauty stiffened, staring up at the sky!
Oh, Autumn! Autumn! - What is the Spring
to me?

[cara]

Favourites:

— Spring
— The Blue-Flag in the Bog
— Elegy Before Death
— Passer Mortuus Est
— Low-Tide
— The Poet and His Book
— Alms
— Wraith
— Burial
— Mariposa
— Doubt No More Than That Oberon
— The Death of Autumn
— Ode to Silence
— Prayer to Persephone
— Sonnets III, VI, VIII, IX, X

[Vanessa]

This has some real gems. I love returning to this collection occasionally, like checking in with an old friend.

[Neila]

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 and shattered spray;
Wanting the loud sound and the soft sound
  Of the big surf that breaks all day.

Always before about my dooryard,
  Marking the reach of the winter sea,
Rooted in sand and dragging drift-wood,
  Straggled the purple wild sweet-pea;

Always I climbed the wave at morning,
  Shook the sand from my shoes at night,
That now am 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 the weirs,

If I could see the weedy mussels
  Crusting the wrecked and rotting hulls,
Hear once again the hungry crying
  Overhead, of the wheeling gulls,

Feel once again the shanty straining
  Under the turning of the tide,
Fear once again the rising freshet,
  Dread the bell in 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 am happy
  Never at all since I came here.
I am too long away from water.
  I have a need of water near.

[Lucy]

Travel

THE railroad 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.

All 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.

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.

[Carl Williams]

I first came to know Edna Saint Vincent Millay studying American social history, as the quintessential bohemian, a precursor and them participant in the Jazz Age of the 20s. Next I came to love her poetry, and the realities she embraces. I think Edna Saint Vincent Millay is one of the underrated American poets. She captures wild realities and modern sensibilities in traditional forms. Good stuff really.

from "Elegy Before Death"
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!

Good stuff. I'm a fan. You should join me.

[John Yelverton]

This is a collection of some very disturbing and depressing poems which almost seem like a cry for help in certain parts. The only redeeming part of this book, though still depressing, was the poem about a book begging to be picked up and read and not forgotten.

[Margaret Oliver]

Loved reading, very accessible.

Nice grouping of early work by this poet. Inconsistent impact, worth comparing to more mature, later poems. Loved when she found her own voice and it came through in a few pieces in this volume.

[Kevin Keating]

I liked some of her poetry but it wasn't the best ever. Really liked her sonnets. But this book meant a lot to my mom so I gave it a read. Glad I did.

[Lucas Smith]

Occasionally I'll read a book and the setting will be so completely tied to my memory that it's impossible for me to think about the book without also thinking of where I was at the time. Sometimes the memory is lovely, like my first reading of Jane Eyre, which was during a visit to Calvin at RWC. I sat in the fireside room in the library while the snow was falling outside and read almost the entire book in a day. Or David Copperfield, which I read in a little office at East Rochester Elementary School while I was subbing. I sat with my feet on the desk and sipped coffee without the nuisance of teaching anybody. (This was the best subbing experience I had.) The memory can also be unpleasant. I read one of the volumes of Sherlock Holmes in the high school band room after taking an early morning Regents exam. Mom couldn't pick me up right away for some reason, so I was attempting to keep warm by lying on the heat register with my coat over me while eating a bag of pretzels. (All of my memories from high school are either cold or smelly.)
I read Second April at some point in high school as well. For some reason or another I remember sitting in a chair in a hallway. Perhaps I was taking another exam. Perhaps I was being punished for skipping a semester of gym. I must have had some time to kill because I filled the margins with notes.
My second reading was much more pleasant. I sat outside of the Village Bakery in Webster in the sunshine, drinking coffee and eating a lemon macaron. Also, ESVM might be one of my favorite poets.

[X]

I’m not really into poetry at all. I was trying to find an audiobook on librivox, and i was hesitant to even bother with poetry... I just kind of wanted something relaxing to listen to while falling asleep that it was okay to miss bits and pieces of, that wouldn’t, like, get me too interested in the story and make me actually lose sleep. Anyway. I thought I’d pick nonfiction or something, but I ended up picking this, this poem book with a pink floral cover
And I actually loved it

Like, forget the deceptive floral cover, these poems are kind of hardcore. I could easily see these being adapted into lyrics for metal music. These poems are almost all very sad (ironically, the most optimistic one was likely the one where the girl ran away from God in the last days and ended up all alone in a charred, barren, post-apocalyptic world - another poem with particular musical potential) and most of them are about death in some way.

Anyway, after binging all of these poems in a day, I think I have a new appreciation for poetry. I’m rather intimidated by the amount of talent it must take to find just that right combination of words to not only tell the story, but also also rhyme, and fit the meter, and make the point... anyway, overall I really enjoyed these.

[Keith]

“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,
Just because it perished?”
-from Passer Mortuus Est

“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”
-from Exiled

Title: Second April
Author: Edna St. Vincent Millay
Year 1921
Genre: Poetry
Page count: 112 pages
Date(s) read: 1/17/23 - 1/19/23
Reading journal entry #24 in 2023

The text: https://digital.library.upenn.edu/wom...

[Eugenea Pollock]

Until I read the 12 Sonnets near the end of this collection, I was actually considering giving this a rating of “3”—I know, blasphemous, presumptuous, etc. But those Sonnets demand more. They explore love in all its various contexts and successfully place the reader in them, thereby expanding both the mind and the heart.

[pajaritoliterario]

Para mí no hay poesía más bonita que la de Edna St. Vincent Millay.
En solo 40 páginas (aproximadamente) logro convertirse en mi poeta favorita.
Sus poemas hacen crecer un poquito el corazón. Estoy convencida de que todo el mundo debería de leer a Millay al menos una vez en la vida; definitivamente cambió la mía de la forma más bella posible.

[Lilly]

3.5/5 stars
Pretty solid poetry collection, particularly the poems "April" and "The Poet and His Book."

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!

[Adam Carrico]

“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!”

I don’t love every poem in this set, but the highs are so high that it’s a must-read.

[Isabel clare]

"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?" i know it's july but this rocked my world

[ジェシカ]

~~~

[Bruce]

Beautiful.

[Lucía ✨]

i love her

[Lisa Brewer]

Very nice way to relax at the end of the day. It was neat to read a vintage copy!

[Kelly]

She sure does love the sea!

[Michael]

Wonderful. The sonnets were a special treat.

[Bobbie]

4.5 Stars. Loved the nature vibes here.

[Omama.]

“April this year, not otherwise
   Than April of a year ago,
Is full 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 grey wood-pecker taps and bores;
   And men are merry at their chores,
And children earnest at their play.
The larger streams run still and deep,
   Noisy and swift the small brooks run;
Among the mullein stalks the sheep
   Go up the hillside in the sun,
   Pensively,—only you are gone,
You that alone I cared to keep.”

[Mattia]

Much more sombre than the other works of Millay's I've read. The poems are about death and the end of love, with many descriptions of the sea, and of nature, and classical references. A set of five poems near the end is titled Memorial to D.C. [Vassar 1918]; D.C. was Dorothy Coleman, a close friend and possibly a lover of Millay's who died in the flu epidemic that year, prompting Millay to write at least some of these poems. Her publisher asked her to remove the five poems about D.C., but she refused. From the collection:

Lament

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'll 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;

Anne 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;

Anne, eat your breakfast;

Dan, take your medicine;

Life must go on;

I forget just why.

[Two Readers in Love]

With a title like this, you won't be surprised to learn that this book contains my second-favorite poem about April:

"SPRING

To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Beauty is not enough.
You can no longer quiet me with the redness
Of little leaves opening stickily.
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 under ground are the brains of men
Eaten by maggots,
Life in itself
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 strewing flowers.
"

I think it is those sticky little leaves that stretch across the ~100 years since this poem was published (1921) and snag me.

This book is available as an eBook in the public domain thanks to the volunteers at Project Gutenberg. http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1247

[Lightreads]

From the middle period of Millay's life. I loved it, but then again I always do with her. I have a marked preference for her sonnets -- the longer
poems are equally beautiful in diction and image, but the repetitive, sing-songy pattern which made Millay famous and which I like very much is something
of a detriment over a hundred lines, pushing the poem down into consciousness so all you actively perceive is the rhythm. But yes, I love the sonnets and
Millay herself, her bravado, her cunning, her brazen sexuality, her wistful view of the human condition.