Song
Song - context Summary
Written for a Bridal Day
This short lyric was published in 1827 in Poe’s collection Tamerlane and Other Poems and is explicitly set on a "bridal day." The speaker watches a woman marry while a blush on her cheek—perhaps maidenly modesty—ignites his private longing. The wedding occasion frames the poem’s tension between public happiness and the speaker’s solitary ache, making the blush both an innocent sign and the trigger for forbidden desire. Repetition of the bridal-day image bookends the poem, underlining how the social ritual deepens the speaker’s personal sorrow.
Read Complete AnalysesI saw thee on thy bridal day - when a burning blush came o’er thee, though happiness around thee lay, the world all love before thee: And in thine eye a kindling light (whatever it might be) was all on Earth my aching sight of Loveliness could see. That blush, perhaps, was maiden shame - as such it well may pass - though its glow hath raised a fiercer flame in the breast of him, alas! Who saw thee on that bridal day, when that deep blush would come o’er thee, though happiness around thee lay, the world all love before thee.
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