What Is The Mood Of The Poem What Lips My Lips Have Kissed And Where And Why

In the poem, “What Lips My Lips Have Kissed and Where and Why?” by Edna St. Vincent Millay, indicates that she has become an older woman who can’t remember the loves in her past that have come and gone. Throughout this poem there are hints and reasoning behind my thoughts on why Millay has described herself in this poem. I will go through this poem dissecting short parts of the poem to prove my point. “What lips my lips have kissed, and where and why, I have forgotten, and what arms have lain Under my head till morning…” The very first line introduces the subject of the poem. She describes herself thinking back on the lips she has kissed and why. The way she describes the lips, and birds in the next set of lines, represents concrete things in her past; beautiful, alive, and vibrant. Now they are only blurred visions which she can’t fully remember. Those who merely skim the poem
Usually winter is associated with cold, grey, dreary days. To be alone in the winter could suggest she’s alone for the holidays as well which could associate with her sadness. If she celebrated with loves in the past, these silent days could affect her moods. Millay’s use of a lonely tree could mean she doesn’t see the change into winter as a brightening change. She could feel her beauty has fallen with age, as the leaves of the lonely tree. Her choice of the word vanished suggests that the birds did not fly visibly away, but that their absence was noted after they had gone. Alike, her former self did not suddenly fly away, but was eventually seen to have vanished. Though the tree knows its limbs more silent than before, suggests that she knows her life was livelier than what it is now. She can’t remember what has happened in the past or recollect all of the previous memories of the lads but she knows now it was never this lonely and quiet in her