To My Dear and Loving Husband - Anne bradstreet

"To My Dear and Loving Husband" was written by America's first female poet, the Puritan, Anne
Bradstreet. In fact, Anne Bradstreet is one of only a handful of female American poets during the first
200 years of America's history. After Bradstreet, one can list only Phillis Wheatley, the 18th century
black female poet, Emma Lazarus, the 19th century poet whose famous words appear on the Statue of
Liberty, and the 19th century Emily Dickinson, America's most famous female poet.

"To My Dear and Loving Husband" has several standard poetic features. One is the two line rhyme
scheme. Another is the anaphora, the repetition of a phrase, in the first three lines. And a third is the
popular iambic pentameter.

Iambic pentameter is characterized by an unrhymed line with five feet or accents. Each foot contains an
unaccented syllable and an accented syllable, as in "da Dah, da Dah, da Dah, da Dah, da Dah."

The subject of Anne Bradstreet's love poem is her professed love for her husband. She praises him and
asks the heavens to reward him for his love. The poem is a touching display of love and affection and
extraordinarily uncommon for the Puritan era of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in which Anne
Bradstreet lived.

Puritan women were expected to be reserved, domestic, and subservient to their husbands. They were
not expected or allowed to exhibit their wit, charm, intelligence, or passion. John Winthrop, the
Massachusetts governor, once remarked that women who exercised wit or intelligence were apt to go
insane.

Anne Bradstreet was born Anne Dudley in 1612 in England. She married Simon Bradstreet when she
was 16 and they both sailed with her family to America in 1630. The difficult, cold voyage to America
took 3 months to complete. John Winthrop was also a passenger on the trip. The voyage landed in
Boston and the passengers joined the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

The men in Anne Bradstreet's family were managers and politicians. Both her father and her husband
became Massachusetts governors. Her husband, Simon, often traveled for weeks throughout the colony
as its administrator.

Anne Bradstreet's poem, "To My Dear and Loving Husband," was a response to her husband's absence.

Very little is known about Anne Bradstreet's life in Massachusetts. There are not portraits of her and she
does not even have a grave marker. She and her family moved several times, each time further away
from Boston into the frontier. Anne and Simon had 8 children during a 10 year period, and all the
children survived healthy and safe, a remarkable accomplishment considering the health and safety
hazards of the period.

Anne Bradstreet was highly intelligent and largely self-educated. She took herself seriously as an
intellectual and a poet, reading widely in history, science, art, and literature. However, as a good
Puritan woman, Bradstreet did not make her accomplishments public.

Bradstreet wrote poetry for herself, family, and friends, never meaning to publish them. Consider that
her friend, Anne Hutchinson was intellectual, educated and led women's prayer meetings where
alternative religious beliefs were discussed. She was labeled a heretic and banished from the colony.
Hutchinson eventually died in an Indian attack. Is it any wonder that Anne Bradstreet was hesitant to
publish her poetry and call attention to herself?

Anne Bradstreet's early poems were secretly taken by her brother-in-law to England and published in a
small volume when she was 38. The volume sold well in England, but the poems were not nearly as
accomplished as her later works.

Bradstreet's later works were not published during her lifetime. Her poems about her love for her
husband were private and personal, meant to be shared with her family and friends group only.

Though her health was frequently a concern, especially during childbirth, Anne Bradstreet lived until
60 years of age.

Enjoy "To My Dear and Loving Husband," a remarkable accomplishment.

To My Dear and Loving Husband

If ever two were one, then surely we.

If ever man were lov'd by wife, then thee;

If ever wife was happy in a man,

Compare with me ye women if you can.

I prize thy love more than whole Mines of gold,

Or all the riches that the East doth hold.

My love is such that Rivers cannot quench,

Nor ought but love from thee, give recompence.

Thy love is such I can no way repay,

The heavens reward thee manifold I pray.

Then while we live, in love let's so persever,

That when we live no more, we may live ever.

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 To Her Father with Some Verses

by Anne Bradstreet
(1612-1672)

Most truly honoured, and as truly dear,

If worth in me or ought I do appear,
Who can of right better demand the same
Than may your worthy self from whom it came?
The principal might yield a greater sum,
Yet handled ill, amounts but to this crumb;
My stock's so small I know not how to pay,
My bond remains in force unto this day;
Yet for part payment take this simple mite,
Where nothing's to be had, kings loose their right.
Such is my debt I may not say forgive,
But as I can, I'll pay it while I live;
Such is my bond, none can discharge but I,
Yet paying is not paid until I die.