Sonnet: Bluebeard

by Edna St. Vincent Millay

This door you might not open, and you did;
   So enter now, and see for what slight thing
You are betrayed. . . . Here is no treasure hid,
   No cauldron, no clear crystal mirroring
The sought-for truth, no heads of women slain
   For greed like yours, no writhings of distress,
But only what you see. . . . Look yet again —
   An empty room, cobwebbed and comfortless.
Yet this alone out of my life I kept
   Unto myself, lest any know me quite;
And you did so profane me when you crept
   Unto the threshold of this room to-night
That I must never more behold your face.
   This now is yours. I seek another place.


Monadnock Valley Press > Millay