those who were puzzled or repelled by Bodenheim's complex idiom were forced to recognize its intense individuality. Minna and Myself (1918) and Advice (1920) reveal, first of all, this poet's extreme sensitivity to words. Words, under his hands, have unexpected growths; placid nouns and sober adjectives bear fantastic fruit. Sometimes he packs his metaphors so close that they become inextricably mixed. Sometimes he spins his fantasies so thin that the cord of coherence snaps and the poem frays into unpatterned ravellings. But, at his best, in the realm of the whimsical-grotesque, Bodenheim walks with a light and nimble footstep. POET TO HIS LOVE An old silver church in a forest Is my love for you. The trees around it Are words that I have stolen from your heart. Hangs at the top of my church. It rings only when you come through the forest And then, it has no need for ringing, For your voice takes its place. OLD AGE In me is a little painted square Bordered by old shops with gaudy awnings. And before the shops sit smoking, open-bloused old men, Drinking sunlight. The old men are my thoughts; And I come to them each evening, in a creaking cart, And quietly unload supplies. We fill slim pipes and chat And inhale scents from pale flowers in the center of the square. Strong men, tinkling women, and squealing children They greet the shopkeepers and touch their hats or foreheads to me. . . . Some evening I shall not return to my people. Edna St. Vincent Millay Edna St. Vincent Millay, possibly the most gifted of the younger lyricists, was born February 22, 1892, at Rockland, Maine. After a childhood spent almost entirely in New England, she attended Vassar College, from which she was graduated in 1917. Since that time she has lived in New York City and abroad. Although the bulk of her poetry is not large, the quality of it approaches and sometimes attains greatness. Her first long poem, "Renascence," was written when Miss Millay was scarcely nineteen; it remains today one of the most remarkable poems of this generation. Beginning like a child's aimless verse, it proceeds, with a calm lucidity, to an amazing climax. It is as if a child had, in the midst of its ingenuousness, uttered some terrific truth. The cumulative power of this poem is surpassed only by its beauty. Renascence, Miss Millay's first volume, was published in 1917. It is full of the same passion as its title poem; here is a hunger for beauty so intense that no delight is great enough to give the soul peace. Such poems as "God's World" and the unnamed sonnets vibrate with this rapture. Figs from Thistles (1920) is a far more sophisticated booklet. Sharp and cynically brilliant, Miss Millay's craftsmanship no less than her intuition saves these poems from mere cleverness. Second April (1921) is an intensification of her lyrical gift tinctured with an increasing sadness. Her poignant poetic play, Aria da Capo, first performed by the Provincetown Players in New York, was published in The Monthly Chapbook (England); the issue of July, 1920, being devoted to it. GOD'S WORLD O world, I cannot hold thee close enough! Thy mists that roll and rise! Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag And all but cry with colour! That gaunt crag To crush! To lift the lean of that black bluff! World, World, I cannot get thee close enough! Long have I known a glory in it all, Here such a passion is As stretcheth me apart. Lord, I do fear RENASCENCE All I could see from where I stood These were the things that bounded me; And I could touch them with my hand, I screamed, and-lo!-Infinity Held up before my eyes a glass Through which my shrinking sight did pass Until it seemed I must behold Immensity made manifold; Whispered to me a word whose sound I saw and heard, and knew at last And present, and forevermore. That, sick'ning, I would fain pluck thence All venom out.-Ah, fearful pawn! With individual desire,— Craved all in vain! And felt fierce fire About a thousand people crawl; Perished with each,-then mourned for all! A man was starving in Capri; He moved his eyes and looked at me; That was not mine; mine each last breath |