When we that wore the myrtle wear the dust

Edna St. Vincent Millay's When we that wore the myrtle wear the dust

Edna St. Vincent Millay, one of the most celebrated poets of the early 20th century, was renowned for her lyrical precision, emotional intensity, and unflinching exploration of love, mortality, and defiance. Her sonnet "When we that wore the myrtle wear the dust" encapsulates these themes with striking elegance, blending classical allusions with a modernist sensibility. This essay will examine the poem through multiple lenses—historical and cultural context, literary devices, thematic concerns, and emotional resonance—while also considering Millay’s biography and philosophical underpinnings.

Historical and Cultural Context

Millay wrote during the interwar period, a time of profound social upheaval, feminist awakening, and existential questioning. The aftermath of World War I and the onset of modernism influenced literary voices to grapple with transience, disillusionment, and the search for meaning. Millay, a bohemian and feminist icon, often subverted traditional gender roles in her poetry, embracing female desire and autonomy with a boldness that was radical for her time.

The myrtle, referenced in the opening line, carries classical significance—it was sacred to Aphrodite, symbolizing love and immortality in ancient Greece. By invoking it, Millay situates her poem within a tradition of love poetry while simultaneously foreshadowing its decay ("wear the dust"). This interplay between the eternal and the ephemeral reflects the broader modernist preoccupation with time’s inexorable passage.

Literary Devices and Structure

Though the poem is a sonnet, this analysis will forgo discussion of its rhyme scheme to focus on its imagery, diction, and syntactic control. Millay employs a rich tapestry of contrasts—light and dark, youth and decay, love and oblivion—to underscore the poem’s central tension between life’s fleeting pleasures and the finality of death.

1. Imagery and Symbolism

• "Wore the myrtle wear the dust": The juxtaposition of the myrtle (love, vitality) with dust (mortality, decay) immediately establishes the poem’s meditation on transience.

• "Years of darkness cover up our eyes": The metaphor of eternal night conveys death’s obliteration of perception, reinforcing the theme of inevitable oblivion.

• "Dip oar into the sea": A vivid image of future generations engaging in life’s activities, contrasting with the silenced voices of the dead.

2. Diction and Tone

Millay’s word choices oscillate between romantic idealism ("sweet lust," "arrogant laughter") and stark realism ("muffling mould," "croaking lads"). The phrase "croaking lads" is particularly striking—its harsh consonance ("cr-k") evokes the guttural, unglamorous reality of aging, contrasting with the romanticized past.

3. Syntax and Rhetorical Structure

The poem’s conditional structure ("When we... then let...") creates a solemn, almost prophetic tone. The shift from the collective "we" to the direct address "my love" personalizes the meditation, heightening its emotional impact. The final couplet serves as an epitaph, a plea for posthumous dignity in the face of love’s enduring truth.

Themes

1. Mortality and the Passage of Time

The poem is steeped in the awareness of death’s inevitability. Unlike the carpe diem tradition, which urges indulgence in the face of death, Millay’s speaker accepts oblivion but demands that love’s sanctity remain untainted by future skepticism. The image of future youths "div[ing] for copper coins" suggests life’s trivial pursuits, underscoring the ephemeral nature of human endeavors.

2. Love’s Defiance Against Time

Millay’s assertion that the lovers "lived and died believing love was true" is both triumphant and tragic. It echoes Shakespearean sonnets that immortalize love through verse, yet Millay’s tone is more resigned—there is no promise of poetic immortality, only a plea for silence, for no "slander" to disturb their peace.

3. The Conflict Between Youth and Decay

The poem contrasts the vibrancy of youth ("arrogant laughter and sweet lust") with the grotesquerie of aging ("croaking lads"). This duality reflects Millay’s broader preoccupation with beauty’s impermanence, a theme also present in "What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why."

Comparative Analysis

Millay’s sonnet invites comparison with other meditations on love and death:

• Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18 ("Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?"): Both poets grapple with time’s ravages, but where Shakespeare claims immortality for his beloved through verse, Millay’s lovers find solace only in mutual belief, not artistic preservation.

• John Keats’s "Ode on a Grecian Urn": Like Keats, Millay juxtaposes eternal ideals ("Beauty is truth, truth beauty") with human transience, but her conclusion is more somber—there is no urn to freeze the moment, only the "muffling mould" of the grave.

Biographical and Philosophical Insights

Millay’s personal life—marked by passionate affairs, a bohemian lifestyle, and a refusal to conform to societal expectations—infuses the poem with authenticity. Her relationships (including her open marriage) suggest a lived belief in love’s intensity, even if fleeting. Philosophically, the poem aligns with existentialist thought: love is not an eternal truth but a subjective conviction that gives meaning in a meaningless universe.

Emotional Impact

The poem’s power lies in its quiet defiance. Unlike dramatic elegies, it does not rage against death but instead insists on love’s validity despite it. The final lines—"Who lived and died believing love was true"—resonate because they reject cynicism. In an age of disillusionment (post-WWI, pre-WWII), Millay’s refusal to concede love’s falseness is both poignant and rebellious.

Conclusion

"When we that wore the myrtle wear the dust" is a masterful meditation on love’s endurance in the face of mortality. Through evocative imagery, precise diction, and a sonnet’s disciplined form, Millay crafts a work that is both timeless and deeply rooted in its historical moment. The poem does not seek to transcend death but to preserve the integrity of love against future skepticism. In doing so, it captures the essence of Millay’s poetic voice—passionate, defiant, and unflinchingly honest.

Millay’s sonnet remains a testament to the enduring human need to believe in love’s truth, even as the body returns to dust. It is this emotional sincerity, coupled with technical brilliance, that secures her place among the great lyric poets of the 20th century.

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