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by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892 - 1950)

Love is not all...
 (Sung text for setting by A. Henderson)
 Matches original text
Language: English 
Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink 
Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;
Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink
And rise and sink and rise and sink again;
Love cannot fill the thickened lung with breath,
Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone;
Yet many a man is making friends with death
Even as I speak, for lack of love alone.
It well may be that in a difficult hour,
Pinned down by pain and moaning for release, 
Or nagged by want past resolution's power,
I might be driven to sell your love for peace,
Or trade the memory of this night for food.
It well may be. I do not think I would.

Composition:

    Set to music by Alva Henderson (b. 1940), "Love is not all...", 1994, from Love is not all... , no. 1

Text Authorship:

  • by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892 - 1950), "Sonnet XXX", appears in Fatal Interview, first published 1931

See other settings of this text.


Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2004-08-04
Line count: 14
Word count: 124

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