Steepletop - Borage: Blythe Campbell

Posted At : August 19, 2008 1:00 AM
Related Categories: Poetry

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From "Steepletop," a poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay, appearing in her volume Mine the Harvest, published by HarperCollins.

Read by Blythe Campbell: "I'm taking a break from my garden, where I've been battling with chickweed." Blythe is a third-generation Alaskan and a Master Gardener who has just about had it with this year's "summer" weather. Blythe, her husband Rob and three children live in Anchorage. She is obsessed with the weather; click on "Area Forecast Discussion" in the table.

Edna St. Vincent Millay had her own frustrations with her garden, things she wrote about in her poem "Steepletop." This is the third stanza of the poem:

"Borage, forage for bees
And for those who love blue,
Why must you,
Having only been transplanted
From where you were not wanted
Either by the bee or by me
From under the sage, engage in this
   self-destruction?
I was tender about your slender
   tap-root.
I thought you would send out shoot after
   shoot
Of thick cucumber-smelling, hairy leaves.
But why anybody believes
Anything, I do not know. I thought I
   could trust you."

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