Английская поэзия


ГлавнаяБиографииСтихи по темамСлучайное стихотворениеПереводчикиСсылкиАнтологии
Рейтинг поэтовРейтинг стихотворений

Edna St. Vincent Millay (Эдна Сент-Винсент Миллей)


An Ancient Gesture


I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
Penelope did this too.
And more than once: you can’t keep weaving all day
And undoing it all through the night;
Your arms get tired, and the back of your neck gets tight;
And along towards morning, when you think it will never be light,
And your husband has been gone, and you don’t know where, for years.
Suddenly you burst into tears;
There is simply nothing else to do.

And I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
This is an ancient gesture, authentic, antique,
In the very best tradition, classic, Greek;
Ulysses did this too.
But only as a gesture,—a gesture which implied
To the assembled throng that he was much too moved to speak.
He learned it from Penelope...
Penelope, who really cried.



Edna St. Vincent Millay's other poems:
  1. Inland
  2. Assault
  3. To S. M.
  4. Tavern
  5. Grown-up


Распечатать стихотворение. Poem to print Распечатать (Print)

Количество обращений к стихотворению: 1345


Последние стихотворения


To English version


Рейтинг@Mail.ru

Английская поэзия. Адрес для связи eng-poetry.ru@yandex.ru