Maggie and Milly and Molly and May Analysis

Symbols, Imagery, Wordplay

Form and Meter

When a poet isn't so crazy about capitalization and punctuation, it's safe to assume he'd be more of a free verse kind of guy. That's definitely true to a degree in "maggie and milly and molly...

Speaker

Even though the speaker of "maggie and milly and molly and may" isn't a kid, he sure sounds like one. In fact, it seems like he's right there with these four little girls experiencing their adventu...

Setting

There are plenty of beaches all over the world, and no matter which one you go to, you're bound to see the following: kids, water, sand, and sea creatures. The setting of "maggie and milly and moll...

Sound Check

The overall sound of "maggie and milly and molly and may" is similar to a nursery rhyme, with those dactyls and anapests in lines 1 and 11, that we're tempted to call it one. We get perfectly end r...

What's Up With the Title?

We're going to go ahead and skip the whole, E.E. Cummings doesn't use capitalization spiel. We got that part, right? Good—moving on. "maggie and milly and molly and may" is also a title that capt...

Calling Card

E.E. Cummings was one fun dude. The guy is known for playing with whatever he could get his hands on (poetically speaking, of course). He's recognized (in fancier terms) as being a kind of linguist...

Tough-o-Meter

Well of course we'd give a poem about a fun day at the beach a sea level rating. It doesn't hurt that "maggie and milly and molly and may" is about kids too, which makes the poem's themes pretty ap...

Trivia

Did we mention that Cummings got two degrees from Harvard? And now Harvard is writing about his playfulness. (Source)Cummings was an ambulance driver in France during World War I—that was, until...

Steaminess Rating

"maggie and milly and molly and may" is as tame as it gets in terms of sexiness. Remember, we're still at the age when boys are gross and pretty much everything gives you cooties.