Memories can be beautiful or difficult. “Recuerdo” by Edna St. Vincent Millay, meaning “a memory,” seems to be a bit of both. This memory is hazy and romantic, as Millay and her unnamed partner must have felt as they "watched a fire" (Kennedy) on the ferry on which they traveled all night. “Remembering” is defined by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary as the action or power of bringing to mind. In people's lives, the moments we remember are usually the ones that impact us or mean the most to us. Certainly, this moment in the author's life has meaning and left a lasting impression on him. She remembers being both tired and “very happy,” an emotional state clearly affected, even provoked, by her partner. It's unclear whether this unnamed person is a brother, a lover, or just a friend, but the way the author remembers the night suggests romance. "We were very tired, we were very happy. We had been going back and forth all night on the ferry." These are the first two lines of the poem. The author wants the reader to know that even though they were drained of energy, they were still in good spirits. We know this is important to the tone of the poem because the first two lines of each stanza are these same two lines, repeated a total of three times throughout the poem. It is a testament to human will that even sleepless and exhausted, the company of another person can keep emotions positive. Sparkman 2In the third line, she says the ferry “smelled like a stable.” We now know that smell is the most powerful sense related to memory, so a certain smell can bring a memory to mind as if it were there, happening now, again. It's personal and ta...... middle of paper ......m reads "and we gave him all our money except our metro tickets." This is a profound statement. The old lady needs the money more than they do, and they happily give it up because they have what they need: each other and a way home together. The poem states not clearly, but profoundly that all this couple needs is each other, and that this trip or journey to give a little old lady the food and money that what she so badly needs is more of a joyous occasion simply because of each other's company. This memory, this memory, even though it includes the mother, is not about her, but about the couple traveling together and using the time to enjoy the little things in life; a ferry ride, time spent together on a hillside in the moonlight, watching the sun rise after a long night of travel. Whatever it actually is, the most important thing to the author is the memory itself..