Edna St. Vincent Milay Spring Poetry Poetic Devices

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Spring Poetry Prompt
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Spring Poetry Prompt
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"April/ Comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers" characterizes the the sudden turn in Edna St. Vincent Milay's poem "Spring". The poem is an apparent internal conversation directed at the arrival spring of an unknown speaker who holds a seemingly contemptable attitude to the renewal of life that springs brings. Milay utilizes multiple poetic devices such as personfication and archetype to better convey the bittersweet attitude that the speaker hold for the season of spring.

Immediately, one of the poetic devices that can be found within the poem is the uses of personifcation. the first line of the poem is the speaker directly addressing the month of April by questioning the purpose of April returning again.

The poem describes the process of spring, so natrually the speaer notes details of spring such as the sun shining on their neck, the spikes of the crocus blooming, and the pleasant smell of the earth. However, the poem twists the archetype of spring by having this period of rebith remind the speaker of death. The speaker sees the life that springs brings as insignificant. The speaker acknowledges the beauty spring brings is not enough to quiet their thoughts on death, the speaker can only note how the ground is filled with the brains of men eaten by maggots, and how life itself is nothing. The speaker sees life as an empty cup, and they are not pacified by the life and joy springs brings as they remian unfulfilled. Instead to the speaker, spring is an idiot that annually tries in vain to alleviate the speaker of their thoughts on the inevitability of