In 1921, two volumes of Edna St. Vincent Millay's poetry were published in New York: A Few Figs from Thistles and Second April. The latter contains many poems about Millay's romantic disappointments and heartbreaks. These poems are sometimes passionate and sometimes subdued, but they are all intensely personal. Scholars often comment that Millay's poetry is feminine in its focus on emotions, but it also breaks from the feminine tradition in its raw honesty. "Wild Swans," which appears in Second April, is a good example of this phenomenon.