Departure
Departure
Original Text
Edna St. Vincent Millay, The Harp-Weaver and Other Poems (New York and London: Harper, 1923): 17-18. 6th printing. PS 3525 I495H3 Robarts Library.
1It's little I care what path I take,
2And where it leads it's little I care;
3But out of this house, lest my heart break,
4I must go, and off somewhere.
5It's little I know what's in my heart,
6What's in my mind it's little I know,
7But there's that in me must up and start,
8And it's little I care where my feet go.
9I wish I could walk for a day and a night,
10And find me at dawn in a desolate place
11With never the rut of a road in sight,
12Nor the roof of a house, nor the eyes of a face.
13I wish I could walk till my blood should spout,
14And drop me, never to stir again,
15On a shore that is wide, for the tide is out,
16And the weedy rocks are bare to the rain.
17But dump or dock, where the path I take
18Brings up, it's little enough I care;
19And it's little I'd mind the fuss they'll make,
20Huddled dead in a ditch somewhere.
21 "Is something the matter, dear," she said,
22"That you sit at your work so silently?"
23"No, mother, no, 'twas a knot in my thread.
24 There goes the kettle, I'll make the tea."
Publication Start Year
1919
Publication Notes
Published in Ainslee's
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
RPO 1998.
Rhyme