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Read more poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay: Edna St. Vincent Millay Poems at Poetry X.

More poems by Edna St. Vincent MillayEdna St. Vincent Millay | Print this page.Print | Order a PoetryNotes Analysis of this poem.Analysis | View and Write CommentsComments

Alms

Edna St. Vincent Millay

My heart is what it was before,
A house where people come and go;
But it is winter with your love,
The sashes are beset with snow.

I light the lamp and lay the cloth,
I blow the coals to blaze again;
But it is winter with your love,
The frost is thick upon the pane..

I know a winter when it comes:
The leaves are listless on the boughs;
I watched your love a little while,
And brought my plants into the house.

I water them and turn them south,
I snap the dead brown from the stem;
But it is winter with your love,
I only tend and water them.

There was a time I stood and watched
The small, ill-natured sparrows' fray;
I loved the beggar that I fed,
I cared for what he had to say,

I stood and watched him out of sight:
Today I reach around the door
And set a bowl upon the step;
My heart is what it was before,

But it is winter with your love;
I scatter crumbs upon the sill,
And close the window, —and the birds
May take or leave them, as they will.

Added: 6 Oct 2002 | Last Read: 5 Sep 2008 12:30 PM | Viewed: 2836 times

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URL: http://plagiarist.com/poetry/7300/ | Viewed on 5 September 2008.
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