CAMELOT FANTASIES

Edna St. Vincent Millay was the first woman to win a Pulitzer Prize for poetry. She was openly bisexual and had affairs with other women and married men. When she finally married, hers was an open marriage. Her 1920 poetry collection A Few Figs From Thistles drew controversy for its novel exploration of female sexuality. She was one of the earliest and strongest voices for what became known as feminism. One of the recurring themes of her poetry was that men might use her body, but not possess her or have any claim over her. (And perhaps that their desire for her body gave her the upper hand in relationships.)






 
I, Being Born a Woman, and Distressed




by Edna St. Vincent Millay

 I, being born a woman, and distressed
 By all the needs and notions of my kind,
 Am urged by your propinquity to find
 Your person fair, and feel a certain zest
 To bear your body's weight upon my breast:
 So subtly is the fume of life designed,
 To clarify the pulse and cloud the mind,
 And leave me once again undone, possessed.
 Think not for this, however, this poor treason
 Of my stout blood against my staggering brain,
 I shall remember you with love, or season
 My scorn with pity — let me make it plain:
 I find this frenzy insufficient reason
 For conversation when we meet again.