MILLAY | Recuerdo (The Ferry Poem)

Millay

(This poem was shown on the New York City subway system for years, in its Poetry in Motion series...)

Recuerdo

by Edna St. Vincent Millay

We were very tired, we were very merry—
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
It was bare and bright, and smelled like a stable—
But we looked into a fire, we leaned across a table,
We lay on a hill-top underneath the moon;
And the whistles kept blowing, and the dawn came
       soon.

We were very tired, we were very merry—
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry;
And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear,
From a dozen of each we had bought somewhere;
And the sky went wan, and the wind came cold,
And the sun rose dripping, a bucketful of gold

We were very tired, we were very merry
We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
We hailed, “Good morrow, mother!” to a shawl-
       covered head,
And bought a morning paper which neither of us
       read;
And she wept, “God bless you!” for the apples and
       pears,
and we gave her all our money but our subway fares.

 

Note: Millay's poems are now in the public domain. She died on October 19, 1950, 70 years ago, a year after her husband Eugen Boissevain died of cancer. Millay wrote: "I never did anything for you but survive you. But that was much." Here is a fine 2017 tribute to Millay on the 100th anniversary of her graduation from Vassar—https://stories.vassar.edu/2017/170202-millay-at-steepletop.html.