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When Anne Bradstreet's house burned in 1666 in New England, she wrote, as was typical for her, a poem about it:

Thou hast an house on high erect;
Framed by that mighty Architect,
With glory richly furnished,
Stands permanent though this be fled.
It's purchased, and paid for, too,
By Him who had enough to do—

This spiritual confidence often found its way into Bradstreet's writings. But it is the skill she brought to her literary art that places her among America's greatest poets. Her volume of poems was the first original book of poetry written in the North American colonies. Combining the longings of the human heart with devout faith, the collection shatters the stereotype of the stodgy, prudish Puritan.

Born Anne Dudley in 1612 in a Northampton (England) castle, where her father was a steward for the Puritan Earl of Lincoln, Anne enjoyed the advantages of privilege and wealth, once noting, "When I was about seven … I had at one time eight tutors … in languages, music, dancing."

At 16, she married Simon Bradstreet, a graduate of Cambridge and also a steward at the earl's estate. Two years later, in 1630, they came to Massachusetts with a group of Puritans led by John Winthrop.

These sudden changes didn't suit her: "I changed my condition and was married, and came into this country, where I found a new world and new manners, at which my heart rose [in anger]," she later wrote her children. "But after I was convinced it was the way of God, I submitted to it."

Writing from the heart
Anne led the demanding life of a mother (bearing eight children) and the relatively comfortable life of a wife whose husband traveled in the highest circles of Massachusetts society.

Amid her domestic duties, she found time to write poetry. Her brother-in-law thought it so good, he managed to get a few of her poems printed in England, under the title, The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America.

Today, Anne Bradstreet is considered the first American poet, and though her poetry was admired by many contemporaries, others criticized her for even taking it up. She noted this in one poem:

I was obnoxious to each carping tongue
Who says my hand a needle better fits,
A Poet's pen all scorn I should thus wrong,
for such despite they cast on Female wits.

The criticism didn't stop her from continuing to write: about nature, marriage, children, and faith—sometimes all at once. In To My Dear and Loving Husband, she celebrates marital love while pointing to a love more eternal:

If ever two were one, then surely we.
If ever man were loved 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,
Of all the riches that the East doth hold.
My love is such that rivers
    cannot quench,
Nor ought but love from thee
    give recompense.
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.

One of her most poignant poems was written in 1665 upon the death of an infant grandchild. In part, it read:

Farewel dear babe, my hearts
    too much content,
Farewel sweet babe, the pleasure
    of mine eye,
Farewel fair flower that for
    a space was lent
Then ta'en away unto Eternity.

As one historian put it, her poetry shows "a Puritan could combine sexual passion, love of children and good furniture, humor—that the female Puritan, in short, could be both a Puritan and a woman of great charm."

He forgot to add: and a poet of great faith.

Adapted from CHRISTIAN HISTORY magazine. To subscribe to CHRISTIAN HISTORY, call 1-800-873-6986.

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