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O World, I cannot hold You close enough!
Your winds, Your wide gray skies!
Your mists that roll and rise!
Your woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag
And all but cry with color! That giant crag
To crush! To life the lean of that black bluff!
World, World, I cannot get You close enough!
Long have I known a glory in it all,
But never knew I this;
Here such a passion is
As stretches me apart. God, I fear
You’ve made the World too beautiful this year.
My soul is all but out of me—let fall
No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.
Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950) a poet and playwright, was the first woman to receive, in 1923, the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. The publication of her poem “Renascence” attracted the attention that earned her a scholarship to Vassar College, after which she moved to New York City where she wrote her famous volume, The Harp-Weaver and Other Poems, for which she won the Pultizer.
