What Lips

Everything changes. Everyone goes through transitions in life. As people age, they begin to realize that every transition takes them one step closer to dying. Terrified that they have less life to look forward to, they turn retrospective, hoping to relive memories of past days of glory. When they find that their memories have become ghostly wisps of what was once so vivaciously real, they become depressed and discouraged. Edna St. Vincent Millay addresses this human condition in her Italian sonnet, ?What Lips My Lips Have Kissed, and Where and Why.?

In its first octave, the sonnet appears to be the disillusioned lament of a seasoned lover. The lines speak of lonely nights and ?lads? who will never lie with her again (7). But when the sonnet reaches the end of the octave, a second possible meaning appears. The sestet does not seem to speak of lovers, but of all things lost. When the sonnet is reexamined, it transforms from an elegy for lovers past, into a requiem for all that has been lost from memory.

It would be foolish, of course, to deny that the poem does not hold its most readily apparent meaning. It is quite possible that Millay sometimes wistfully looked back at the affairs of her youth. But that interpretation does not fully explain the poem. Her use of the Italian sonnet form leads the reader to expect an important turn in the poem?s narrative. When the change comes, her imagery depicts symbols of aging and loneliness. She pensively observes how ?in the winter stands the lonely tree? and remembers ?that summer sang in [her] a little while? but that it does not sing in her anymore (9, 13). These seasonal descriptions call to mind two opposing phases in people?s lives. In the summer, they enjoy their prime, old enough to do what they want, yet young enough to be very active. By the time the winter of life comes, all that was once young and vibrant has fallen off like dead leaves.

A feeling of dramatic loss is not unique to those moving into old age. Millay?s poem has a cross-generational appeal, speaking to anyone going through a transition in life. The freshman who moves to college and must adjust to independence, the graduate student who needs to find a job, the couple who discover that they will have a child?all these people are leaving comfortable lives which they will never get back. Though their future may not end up as barren as Millay paints hers, they experience the same loss of the irreplaceable: time.

?What lips my lips have kissed? begins the poem (1). ?What lips?? asks the reader. Those who merely browse the poem immediately think of various young men with whom Millay might have had affairs. But lips do more than kiss; they speak or could act as a metaphor for things that she has written. Instead of reading ?what lips my lips have kissed,? the reader could construe the opening to speak of the things that the poet has said and done (1). The interpretation would make perfect sense when suffixed by the phrase ?and where, and why/I have forgotten? (l, 2). As she grows older, her memories of her actions and motives grow dim. She cannot remember ?what arms have lain/Under [her] head till morning? (2, 3). Are the arms her lovers? or her own? Or perhaps both? Certainly, a thoughtful person might lean back on their own arms and think ?till morning? (3). Unfortunately, whatever she did with those arms, she has now forgotten it. She has lost not only the most unimportant but also most profound of her thoughts.

Becoming more pensive, the author moves from the metaphor of lovers to that of rain, which creates the image of tears or of wistful longing. This rain, especially, ?is full of ghosts,? memories of the past, ?that tap and sigh? against ?the glass? of her thoughts (4, 5). The persistent patter of the rain calls to mind the image of memories, driving and beating against her head like a relentless rain. These thoughts pause from time to time and ?listen for reply,? but she is unable to grant them full recognition; she has forgotten (5). Millay?s grief becomes poignant as she describes how in her ?heart there sits a quiet pain/For unremembered lads that not again/Will turn to [her] at midnight with a cry? (6-8). While the other lines present