The Spring And The Fall

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1923

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Form and Meter

"The Spring and the Fall” is comprised of three stanzas with six lines apiece. A stanza with six lines is called a sestet, so the poem is made of three sestets. With a total number of 18 lines, the poem is compact and short, aligning with the lyric genre. Lyrics tend to be brief. The tiny aspect of Millay’s poem matches the "little ways” (Line 12 and 18) that love retreats and breaks the speaker’s heart.

Although the poem has no traditional meter, it possesses a continually melodious sound that makes it read like there’s standard meter present. The playfulness with meter represents Millay’s ability to juggle contemporary poetics and traditional poetry. She nods to tradition with a pleasant-sounding poem while at once rebelling against it by varying the feet—the stresses on the syllables—in the lines. Of course, the poem has a set rhyme scheme. In each stanza, the first two lines rhyme, the middle two lines rhyme, and the last lines rhyme.

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The form might relate to the theme of fate and inevitability. The speaker knows that love—like the days and seasons—will leave and return. The reader, too, knows what lines will rhyme with each other. They know when they're about to leave a rhyme and start another one.

Juxtaposition

Juxtaposition is a literary device that puts two things together to highlight their similarities and differences. The title, "The Spring and the Fall,” is the central juxtaposition in the poem. Millay places spring in Stanza 1 and fall in Stanza 2 to tease out their differences. In Stanza 1, spring, love, and nature are in bloom; the setting is harmonious—if not romantic—with her "dear” giving the speaker "a bough of the blossoming peach” (Line 5). In Stanza 2, fall, love, and nature aren’t blooming. The crows screech while the man, no longer romantic, laughs at the speaker and her interests. The difference between Stanza 1 and Stanza 2 bolsters the distinctive elements of fall and spring.

Stanza 3, however, collapses the juxtaposition by bringing together the seasons. In both spring and fall, there’s "much that’s fine to see and hear” (Line 15). Moreover, in Line 16, Millay subverts the repetition started in Line 1 and continued in Line 7 by not saying the same season twice, but saying two different seasons: "In the spring of a year, in the fall of a year.” Perhaps spring and fall aren’t in juxtaposition after all since both seasons are a part of "a year” and the melancholy cycle of days and love.

Atmosphere

Atmosphere is a literary device that helps the poet create a feeling in their poem. The poet generates the mood, style, and tone through diction and imagery. Millay’s poem immediately produces a circular atmosphere by using repetitive words and phrases. The first line repeats "in the spring of the year,” which occurs again in Line 4. Line 7 repeats Line 1 with one change: Fall supplants spring. Line 10 repeats "the fall of the year,” and "the spring of a year” and "the fall of a year'' reappear together in Line 16.

Of course, repetition is a literary device on its own. In Millay’s poem, repetition serves the atmosphere since it advances the themes of fate and the inevitable. There are certain words and phrases bound to reappear (sometimes slightly modified), and there are particular moods and struggles the speaker can’t avoid. Thus, the repetition reinforces the sad, pensive atmosphere of the poem since it calls attention to her situation. She’s trapped—bound to repeat falling in and out of love and having a heart broken "in little ways” (Line 18).