I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
Penelope did this too.
And more than once: you can’t keep weaving all day
And undoing it all through the night;
Your arms get tired, and the back of your neck gets tight;
And along towards morning, when you think it will never be light,
And your husband has been gone, and you don’t know where, for years.
Suddenly you burst into tears;
There is simply nothing else to do.
And I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
This is an ancient gesture, authentic, antique,
In the very best tradition, classic, Greek;
Ulysses did this too.
But only as a gesture,—a gesture which implied
To the assembled throng that he was much too moved to speak.
He learned it from Penelope…
Penelope, who really cried.
Analysis By Danna Hobart of An Ancient Gesture by Edna St. Vincent Millay
I was drawn to this poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay for its unique understatement. At first glance, it does not appear to be more than a poem about a woman wiping her eyes on her apron, but when you look deeper, you discover the exciting world of allusion.
According to wikipedia.org, an allusion is the implicit referencing of a related object or circumstance, which has occurred or existed in an external context. An allusion is understandable only to those with prior knowledge of the reference in question which the writer assumes to be so.
For me, allusion, symbolism, metaphor, and simile, are the very heart of a poem. The Bible and mythology are two poetic favorites when it comes to creating allusions. Millay makes the myths of ancient Greece relevant to every day life in her poem.
An Ancient Gesture
I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
Penelope did this too.
And more than once: you can’t keep weaving all day
And undoing it all through the night;
Your arms get tired, and the back of your neck gets tight;
And along towards morning, when you think it will never be light,
And your husband has been gone, and you don’t know where, for years.
Suddenly you burst into tears;
There is simply nothing else to do.
And I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
This is an ancient gesture, authentic, antique,
In the very best tradition, classic, Greek;
Ulysses did this too.
But only as a gesture,—a gesture which implied
To the assembled throng that he was much too moved to speak.
He learned it from Penelope…
Penelope, who really cried.
A line by line analysis of the poem:
I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron… The image of a woman wearing an apron makes the reader of kitchens and cooking, perhaps she wipes her eyes on her apron because she is chopping onions that make her eyes water.
Penelope did this too…. is a character of the Odyssey, an epic poem by the Greek philosopher, Homer. Penelope is the wife of the main character, king Ulysses. She waits twenty years for him to return from Trojan War, and struggles with the temptation of several marriage proposals from different princes in his absence. The four simple words can be so emotive if you know the story of Penelope and Ulysses. “Penelope did this too,” brings an image of the Spartan woman looking out across the Mediterranean scanning the horizon for the ship that would carry her husband back to her, worrying about whether he was even yet alive, and what‘s more, was he remaining as faithful to her love as she was to his, and wiping her pining tears with a piece of fabric.
And more than once: you can’t keep weaving all day…
And undoing it all through the night; …weaving: to create fabric, an ancient textile art and craft that turns thread or yarn into fabric by means of a loom. Penelope told her perspective suitors that she would not marry them until the tapestry she was weaving was complete, and she would weave all day long, and then undo the threads all night, to stall their persistant pleas for her hand, because she was faithful heart and soul to Ulysses. There is a second implication in relation to one’s emotions. If a person’s emotions are weaving back and forth, they are unsuccessfully trying to weigh thoughts; possibilities in their mind, not coming up with any answers. Millay likens what she is doing in the kitchen wearing her apron to the weaving that Penelope did.
Your arms get tired, and the back of your neck gets tight;… Certainly weaving all day would make one’s arms tired and neck tight, but any person who has worried or been stressed out can identify with that tightness in the back of their neck.
And along towards morning, when you think it will never be light,… before the computer age, those of us who suffer insomnia suffered it alone, sitting up, watching reruns of The Andy Griffith Show at 3:00 a.m. thinking that the sun would never rise.
And your husband has been gone, and you don’t know where, for years… This line while a very telling line also clarifies the image Millay created of the woman in the apron, like Penelope, she waits on a spouse who has not come home, possibly cooking to pass the hours of worry, staring out her kitchen window at the empty street, waiting for the car to pull in, wiping her tears as she waits, wiping her eyes on her apron.
Odysseus was a man of strong will and determination throughout the Trojan War and the trials he endured at sea, but he demonstrates weakness and wavering resolve when he is faced with sexual temptation. For example, when enticed by Circe to “mingle and make love,” he succumbs to her allure committing adultery against Penelope.
Suddenly you burst into tears;
There is simply nothing else to do.
And I thought, as I wiped my eyes on the corner of my apron:
This is an ancient gesture, authentic, antique,
In the very best tradition, classic, Greek;
Ulysses did this too.
But only as a gesture,—a gesture which implied
To the assembled throng that he was much too moved to speak.
He learned it from Penelope…
Penelope, who really cried…. The last stanza is a strong statement, which implies that Ulysses pretended to be moved to tears, in order to avoid addressing the assemblage of people, but his were crocodile tears, whereas Penelope had really wept in worry and fear, faithfully waiting twenty years for her husband to return. Millay’s careful choice of these two characters gives an intimate portrait of her fears about her relationship with her own husband, and makes this poem so much more than an account of a woman wiping her eyes with her apron.
