Sara Teasdale’s speaker has been happy for two weeks because her love is coming home. She sees that inward joy reflected in the landscape: weather bright as gold and silver, the sea smooth and blue as lapis, the hills greening after three nights of rain. Birds are active—linnets preen with a touch of scarlet, and wild swans whistle far up in the mountains. It is a lush, vivid Santa Barbara spring. But the last two lines turn the feeling inward and more complicated. She has been “still as stone,” and her heart sings only when it breaks. That suggests the happiness is so intense it feels close to pain, or that she has been holding herself together through longing. The result is a tender, bittersweet mood: the outer world is full of motion and color, while the speaker waits, moved and fragile.
In Spring, Santa Barbara — Summary
I have been happy two weeks together, My love is coming home to me, Gold and silver is the weather And smooth as lapis is the sea.
The earth has turned its brown to green After three nights of humming rain, And in the valleys peck and preen Linnets with a scarlet stain.
High in the mountains all alone The wild swans whistle on the lakes, But I have been as still as stone, My heart sings only when it breaks.