SOURCE: '"To Finish What's Begun': Anne Bradstreet's Last Words," in Early American Literature, Vol. 23, No. 2, 1988, pp. 175–87.

In the following essay, Kopacz discusses the endings of Bradstreet's poems.

On a number of occasions Anne Bradstreet indicated concern about finishing her poems. In marking the hiatus after writing the first three sections of the long poem "The Four Monarchies," for example, she writes, "After some days of rest, my restless heart / To finish what's begun, new thoughts impart" (lines 1–2). Three-fourths of the way finished, she found herself "restless" to get on with the job. Forced to cut short her description of the fourth monarchy, under a formal "Apology" she writes, "To finish what's begun, was my intent" (line 3553), and she explains the circumstances that made finishing impossible. To be sure, many critics have voiced relief that this particular poem was not finished. But finishing, in the sense of completing...