May

I cannot tell you how it was;
But this I know: it came to pass
Upon a bright and breezy day
When May was young; ah, pleasant May!
As yet the poppies were not born
Between the blades of tender corn;
The last eggs had not hatched as yet,
Nor any bird forgone its mate.

I cannot tell you what it was;
But this I know: it did but pass.
It passed away with sunny May,
With all sweet things it passed away,
And left me old, and cold, and grey.
(1855)

Marsh doesn't anthologize this poem in her collection of CGR's poems. Too bad - it's a profound poem and may best exemplify some of the elusivity of the author. I remember being shocked by the poem the first time I'd read it. Although the first stanza portends something bad happening, I was not prepared for the last line of the poem. Even the second stanza didn't prepare me for it. I asked one of my office mates to read only the first stanza to see what tone she detected. Her answer was "foreboding." She confirmed what I'd remembered from my initial reading. There is a reflective tone - things that once were, no longer are - and yet the reflection anticipates a revelation of some sort. The poem anticipates some current sadness; nevertheless, the final line stings.

Twice the poet repeats the line "I cannot tell you how it was..." this could be taken two ways, either she cannot tell because she knows but for some reason is unwilling to reveal what it was. Or she doesn't know herself. The latter seem to be the case for in the second line of the second stanza she continues with "But this I know" the inference is I don't know, but I know some part or aspect of it. Again nature's transitory state is used to exemplify this change. My neighbor Anna viewed the poem in terms of a loss of sexual innocence, a disillusionment with sexual experience, maybe even menstruation. The poet is 25 at this point, so I don't think this is what she's writing about. Again, I'm tempted to go and look at what was happening in her life at the time of writing, but I won't - Sola Poema! (as I'm sure Martin Luther would say if he were here).

The internal rhyme in the final line forces the reader to slow down - the rolling sound of "old" and "cold" has an hypnotic effect like a dirge. The "it came to pass" of line two seems to indicate that "it" was some event that like the end of spring brought about some change. And it seems to have come suddenly - an event of one day. The speaker does not say what she was like before May passed, before she was old, cold, and grey, but we have the spring-like imagery to go on and this does tell us something. The poppies had not grown up in the corn fields yet, eggs had not yet hatched, and the bird had not left his mate. This last seems the most revealing conveying: My love had not yet departed. Whatever "it" was, it brought joy with its arrival and sorrow with its sudden departure. CGR punctuates words nicely by means of repetition. First, May is repeated three times in the poem. Whole lines are repeated. But my favorite word repetition is "pass" and "passed." Pass is used differently between the stanzas. First: "it came to pass" - conveying an advent of something. In stanza two this line is changed to "it did but pass" - conveying departure. the next two lines deepen this idea by repeating the words "passed" and describing the passage: it left with the spring month and it left with all things sweet.

In an article on the Victorian Web, Abagail Newman discusses the direct address of the poem. CGR is intentionally pulling us in while betraying nothing of the secret. I don't think however she is keeping a secret. Rather the poet may be, but the speaker is almost asking the reader to help her discern what it is.