To Helen

“To Helen” has three stanzas with five lines each. The first-person speaker is generally considered to be Poe himself, writing to a woman named Jane Stanard. He describes this woman’s beauty with references to the Greek myths, especially those about the beautiful Helen of Troy.

The first two stanzas are located at sea. The specific locations listed in the second stanza, Greece and Rome, as well as the mythology he references point to Poe writing about the Aegean Sea. The sea is also a symbolic place away from Helen, who is the addressee of the poem, or the “thee” (Line 12)—an outdated word for you—of the poem. The sea is a place where the speaker roams: “On desperate seas long wont to roam” (Line 6). This characterizes the speaker as a traveler.

In this nautical location, Helen’s beauty is compared to boats that carry the traveler home. Poe’s simile includes the “Nicéan barks of yore” (Line 2), where “barks” means boats and “of yore” means from a long time ago. However, scholars interpret “Nicéan” in several different ways. To connect with Homer’s Odyssey, Nicéan has been read as a version of Phoenician. Other interpretations include the boats being from the ancient town Nicaea (modern Nice, France) or the island of Nysa (a reference to the Greek god Dionysus). In any case, the boats represent the power of Helen’s beauty to bring the exhausted traveler home.

The speaker’s characterization as a sea-born traveler is framed by a “wanderer” (Line 4) character. The speaker refers to this person using male pronouns: “his own native shore” (Line 5). Given the readings above, the wanderer of the past (yore) could be Odysseus or a worshiper of Dionysus. The speaker describes the wanderer as “weary, way-worn” (Line 4). This also points to Odysseus, who was traveling home after the Trojan War, which was a result of Paris abducting Helen because of her beauty. Poe aligning Helen’s beauty with the boats that carry the wanderer home empowers it. Her beauty is mythic and a force for reuniting a person with a place and a feeling.

In addition to the sea and the traveling men, the speaker describes several aspects of Helen’s beauty. Her “hyacinth hair, thy classic face, / Thy Naiad airs” (Lines 7-8) are highlighted. This is a shortened version of a poetic device called a blazon, which lists a woman’s features. The speaker includes how her hair is flower-like and how her face has features that are considered beautiful in classic art. Poe also references another fairy-type figure from mythology. Naiads are a type of nymph, or ethereal being, attracted to bodies of water. “Airs” means an arrogant temperament. This characterizes Helen as possessing a kind of fairy-like disdain. These elements—both physical and temperamental—are what makes Helen’s beauty have power over the speaker.

The power Helen wields is to carry the speaker home. “Home” (Line 8) can be read as a way to return to the classic myths of Greece and Rome as well as reading the places Poe lists as actual locations. Using the past tense “was” in Lines 9 and 10 to describe Greece and Rome indicates their status in the ancient world and their long-reaching literary influence. The speaker feels at home in reading the works of these cultures, and Helen is connected with the romanticization of the past.

The third and final stanza focuses on Helen, featuring her on land. She is located in a “window-niche” (Line 11), or a part of a home. This window-niche not only frames Helen, emphasizing her picturesque qualities, but also locates her in a protected, domestic space. This domestic environment contrasts with the sea where the wanderer and traveler have been. She is sure-footed, standing “statue-like” (Line 12), unlike the wavy feeling of being on a boat. Her power over the traveler includes becoming stabilized by her.

She also can lead him home safely, like a lighthouse. Poe draws upon many images of women waiting in windows for sailors to return in this final stanza. Helen carries a lamp, which reinforces the light-related imagery that permeates this stanza. The kind of lamp, “agate lamp” (Line 13), is part of the final mythological reference. Poe includes Psyche, another figure from Greek myth, in the penultimate line. Psyche shined a light on Cupid (Eros) and discovered his identity.

The poem ends with a discussion of Psyche’s homeland, which echoes the “native shore” (Line 5) of the wanderer in the first stanza. She is from “the regions which / Are Holy-Land!” (Lines 14-15). Psyche is the goddess of the soul, and the soul originates in a divine location. This final line is shorter than the rest of the lines in the poem. The location is a conclusion, or final resting place for the poem. This elevates being home with Helen to being in a holy realm.