The Betrothal

Millay, Edna St. Vincent (1892 - 1950)

Original Text

Edna St. Vincent Millay, The Harp-Weaver and Other Poems (New York and London: Harper, 1923): 26. 6th printing. PS 3525 I495H3 Robarts Library.

1Oh, come, my lad, or go, my lad,

2And love me if you like.

3I shall not hear the door shut

4Nor the knocker strike.

5Oh, bring me gifts or beg me gifts,

6And wed me if you will.

7I'd make a man a good wife,

8Sensible and still.

9And why should I be cold, my lad,

10And why should you repine,

11Because I love a dark head

12That never will be mine?

13I might as well be easing you

14As lie alone in bed

15And waste the night in wanting

16A cruel dark head.

17You might as well be calling yours

18What never will be his,

19And one of us be happy.

20There's few enough as is.

Publication Start Year

1921

Publication Notes

Published in Poetica Erotica, ed. T. R. Smith: 302

RPO poem Editors

Ian Lancashire

RPO Edition

RPO 1998.

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