The speaker recalls a bright, windswept coastline: blue water, swallows wheeling, sunlit sails, and a child standing on a cliff holding milkweed. The memory feels impossibly close—so vivid that the speaker wonders whether it happened years ago or only yesterday. What triggers it is the smell of milkweed, and with that scent comes a rush of grief, almost a “strangle of tears.” It is not just a pretty seaside scene; it is about how powerfully the senses can recover the past. The child on the cliff seems to be the speaker’s younger self, and the image carries both tenderness and loss. The mood is dreamy and nostalgic, but edged with sadness—like looking at a sunlit memory that you can never quite step back into.
Milkweed — Summary
The blue, blue sea, And the drone of waves, And the wheeling swallows, And the sun on the opal sails, And the misty and salt-bleached headlands, And the milkweed thick at my feet, And the milkweed held in the hand of a child Who dreams on the misty cliff-edge, Watching the fading sails And the noonday blue Of the lonely sea!
Was it all years ago, Or was it but yesterday? I only know that the scent Of the milkweed brings it back, Back with a strangle of tears: The child and the misty headlands, The drone of the dark blue sea, And the opal sails In the sun!