Part 14
Then come so many ships that I could fill Three docks with their fair hulls remembered still, Each with her special memory’s special grace, Riding the sea, making the waves give place To delicate high beauty; man’s best strength, Noble in every line in all their length. _Ailsa_, _Genista_, ships, with long jibbooms, The _Wanderer_ with great beauty and strange dooms, _Liverpool_ (mightiest then) superb, sublime, The _California_ huge, as slow as time. The _Copley_ swift, the perfect _J. T. North_, The loveliest barque my city has sent forth, Dainty _John Lockett_ well remembered yet, The splendid _Argus_ with her skysail set, Stalwart _Drumcliff_, white-blocked, majestic _Sierras_, Divine bright ships, the water’s standard-bearers; _Melpomene_, _Euphrosyne_, and their sweet Sea-troubling sisters of the Fernie fleet; _Corunna_ (in whom my friend died) and the old Long since loved _Esmeralda_ long since sold. _Centurion_ passed in Rio, _Glaucus_ spoken, _Aladdin_ burnt, the _Bidston_ water-broken, _Yola_, in whom my friend sailed, _Dawpool_ trim, Fierce-bowed _Egeria_ plunging to the swim, _Stanmore_ wide-sterned, sweet _Cupica_, tall _Bard_, Queen in all harbors with her moon-sail yard.
Though I tell many, there must still be others, McVickar Marshall’s ships and Fernie Brothers’, _Lochs_, _Counties_, _Shires_, _Drums_, the countless lines Whose house-flags all were once familiar signs At high main-trucks on Mersey’s windy ways When sunlight made the wind-white water blaze. Their names bring back old mornings, when the docks Shone with their house-flags and their painted blocks, Their raking masts below the Custom House And all the marvellous beauty of their bows.
Familiar steamers, too, majestic steamers, Shearing Atlantic roller-tops to streamers, _Umbria_, _Etruria_, noble, still at sea, The grandest, then, that man had brought to be. _Majestic_, _City of Paris_, _City of Rome_, Forever jealous racers, out and home.
The _Alfred Holt’s_ blue smoke-stacks down the stream, The fair _Loanda_ with her bows a-cream. Booth liners, Anchor liners, Red Star liners, The marks and styles of countless ship-designers, The _Magdalena_, _Puno_, _Potosi_, Lost _Cotopaxi_, all well known to me.
These splendid ships, each with her grace, her glory, Her memory of old song or comrade’s story, Still in my mind the image of life’s need, Beauty in hardest action, beauty indeed. “They built great ships and sailed them,” sounds most brave, Whatever arts we have or fail to have. I touch my country’s mind, I come to grips With half her purpose, thinking of these ships: That art untouched by softness, all that line Drawn ringing hard to stand the test of brine; That nobleness and grandeur, all that beauty Born of a manly life and bitter duty; That splendor of fine bows which yet could stand The shock of rollers never checked by land; That art of masts, sail-crowded, fit to break, Yet stayed to strength and backstayed into rake; The life demanded by that art, the keen Eye-puckered, hard-case seamen, silent, lean. They are grander things than all the art of towns; Their tests are tempests and the sea that drowns. They are my country’s line, her great art done By strong brains laboring on the thought unwon. They mark our passage as a race of men— Earth will not see such ships as those again.
CARGOES
Quinquireme of Nineveh from distant Ophir, Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine, With a cargo of ivory, And apes and peacocks, Sandalwood, cedarwood, and sweet white wine.
Stately Spanish galleon coming from the Isthmus, Dipping through the Tropics by the palm-green shores, With a cargo of diamonds, Emeralds, amethysts, Topazes, and cinnamon, and gold moidores.
Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke-stack, Butting through the Channel in the mad March days, With a cargo of Tyne coal, Road-rails, pig-lead, Firewood, iron-ware, and cheap tin trays.
WATCHING BY A SICK-BED
I heard the wind all day, And what it was trying to say. I heard the wind all night Rave as it ran to fight; After the wind the rain, And then the wind again Running across the hill As it runs still.
And all day long the sea Would not let the land be, But all night heaped her sand On to the land; I saw her glimmer white All through the night, Tossing the horrid hair Still tossing there.
And all day long the stone Felt how the wind was blown; And all night long the rock Stood the sea’s shock; While, from the window, I Looked out, and wondered why, Why at such length Such force should fight such strength.
WHAT AM I, LIFE?
What am I, Life? A thing of watery salt Held in cohesion by unresting cells, Which work they know not why, which never halt, Myself unwitting where their Master dwells. I do not bid them, yet they toil, they spin A world which uses me as I use them; Nor do I know which end or which begin Nor which to praise, which pamper, which condemn. So, like a marvel in a marvel set, I answer to the vast, as wave by wave The sea of air goes over, dry or wet, Or the full moon comes swimming from her cave, Or the great sun comes forth: this myriad I Tingles, not knowing how, yet wondering why.
Edgar Lee Masters
SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY
THE HILL
_Where are Elmer, Herman, Bert, Tom and Charley, The weak of will, the strong of arm, the clown, the boozer, the fighter? All, all, are sleeping on the hill._
_One passed in a fever, One was burned in a mine, One was killed in a brawl, One died in a jail, One fell from a bridge toiling for children and wife— All, all are sleeping, sleeping, sleeping on the hill._
_Where are Ella, Kate, Mag, Lizzie and Edith, The tender heart, the simple soul, the loud, the proud, the happy one?— All, all, are sleeping on the hill._
_One died in shameful child-birth, One of a thwarted love, One at the hands of a brute in a brothel, One of a broken pride, in the search for heart’s desire, One after life in far-away London and Paris Was brought to her little space by Ella and Kate and Mag— All, all are sleeping, sleeping, sleeping on the hill._
_Where are Uncle Isaac and Aunt Emily, And old Towny Kincaid and Sevigne Houghton, And Major Walker who had talked With venerable men of the revolution?— All, all, are sleeping on the hill._
_They brought them dead sons from the war, And daughters whom life had crushed, And their children fatherless, crying— All, all are sleeping, sleeping, sleeping on the hill._
_Where is Old Fiddler Jones Who played with life all his ninety years, Braving the sleet with bared breast, Drinking, rioting, thinking neither of wife nor kin, Nor gold, nor love, nor heaven? Lo! he babbles of the fish-frys of long ago, Of the horse-races of long ago at Clary’s Grove, Of what Abe Lincoln said One time at Springfield._
OLLIE M^cGEE
Have you seen walking through the village A man with downcast eyes and haggard face? That is my husband who, by secret cruelty Never to be told, robbed me of my youth and my beauty; Till at last, wrinkled and with yellow teeth, And with broken pride and shameful humility, I sank into the grave. But what think you gnaws at my husband’s heart? The face of what I was, the face of what he made me! These are driving him to the place where I lie. In death, therefore, I am avenged.
DAISY FRASER
Did you ever hear of Editor Whedon Giving to the public treasury any of the money he received For supporting candidates for office? Or for writing up the canning factory To get people to invest? Or for suppressing the facts about the bank, When it was rotten and ready to break? Did you ever hear of the Circuit Judge Helping anyone except the “Q” railroad, Or the bankers? Or did Rev. Peet or Rev. Sibley Give any part of their salary, earned by keeping still, Or speaking out as the leaders wished them to do, To the building of the water works? But I—Daisy Fraser, who always passed Along the streets through rows of nods and smiles, And coughs and words such as “there she goes,” Never was taken before Justice Arnett Without contributing ten dollars and costs To the school fund of Spoon River!
HARE DRUMMER
Do the boys and girls still go to Siever’s For cider, after school, in late September? Or gather hazel nuts among the thickets On Aaron Hatfield’s farm when the frosts begin? For many times with the laughing girls and boys Played I along the road and over the hills When the sun was low and the air was cool, Stopping to club the walnut tree Standing leafless against a flaming west. Now, the smell of the autumn smoke, And the dropping acorns, And the echoes about the vales Bring dreams of life. They hover over me. They question me: Where are those laughing comrades? How many are with me, how many In the old orchards along the way to Siever’s, And in the woods that overlook The quiet water?
DOC HILL
I went up and down the streets Here and there by day and night, Through all hours of the night caring for the poor who were sick. Do you know why? My wife hated me, my son went to the dogs. And I turned to the people and poured out my love to them. Sweet it was to see the crowds about the lawns on the day of my funeral, And hear them murmur their love and sorrow. But oh, dear God, my soul trembled, scarcely able To hold to the railing of the new life When I saw Em Stanton behind the oak tree At the grave, Hiding herself, and her grief!
FIDDLER JONES
The earth keeps some vibration going There in your heart, and that is you. And if the people find you can fiddle, Why, fiddle you must, for all your life. What do you see, a harvest of clover? Or a meadow to walk through to the river? The wind’s in the corn; you rub your hands For beeves hereafter ready for market; Or else you hear the rustle of skirts Like the girls when dancing at Little Grove. To Cooney Potter a pillar of dust Or whirling leaves meant ruinous drouth; They looked to me like Red-Head Sammy Stepping it off, to “Toor-a-Loor.” How could I till my forty acres Not to speak of getting more, With a medley of horns, bassoons and piccolos Stirred in my brain by crows and robins And the creak of a wind-mill—only these? And I never started to plow in my life That some one did not stop in the road And take me away to a dance or picnic. I ended up with forty acres; I ended up with a broken fiddle— And a broken laugh, and a thousand memories, And not a single regret.
THOMAS RHODES
Very well, you liberals, And navigators into realms intellectual, You sailors through heights imaginative, Blown about by erratic currents, tumbling into air pockets, You Margaret Fuller Slacks, Petits, And Tennessee Claflin Shopes— You found with all your boasted wisdom How hard at the last it is To keep the soul from splitting into cellular atoms. While we, seekers of earth’s treasures, Getters and hoarders of gold, Are self-contained, compact, harmonized, Even to the end.
EDITOR WHEDON
To be able to see every side of every question; To be on every side, to be everything, to be nothing long; To pervert truth, to ride it for a purpose, To use great feelings and passions of the human family For base designs, for cunning ends, To wear a mask like the Greek actors— Your eight-page paper—behind which you huddle, Bawling through the megaphone of big type: “This is I, the giant.” Thereby also living the life of a sneak-thief, Poisoned with the anonymous words Of your clandestine soul. To scratch dirt over scandal for money, And exhume it to the winds for revenge, Or to sell papers Crushing reputations, or bodies, if need be, To win at any cost, save your own life. To glory in demoniac power, ditching civilization, As a paranoiac boy puts a log on the track And derails the express train. To be an editor, as I was— Then to lie here close by the river over the place Where the sewage flows from the village, And the empty cans and garbage are dumped, And abortions are hidden.
SETH COMPTON
When I died, the circulating library Which I built up for Spoon River, And managed for the good of inquiring minds, Was sold at auction on the public square, As if to destroy the last vestige Of my memory and influence. For those of you who could not see the virtue Of knowing Volney’s _Ruins_ as well as Butler’s _Analogy_ And _Faust_ as well as _Evangeline_, Were really the power in the village, And often you asked me, “What is the use of knowing the evil in the world?” I am out of your way now, Spoon River— Choose your own good and call it good. For I could never make you see That no one knows what is good Who knows not what is evil; And no one knows what is true Who knows not what is false.
HENRY C. CALHOUN
I reached the highest place in Spoon River, But through what bitterness of spirit! The face of my father, sitting speechless, Child-like, watching his canaries, And looking at the court-house window Of the county judge’s room, And his admonitions to me to seek My own in life, and punish Spoon River To avenge the wrong the people did him, Filled me with furious energy To seek for wealth and seek for power. But what did he do but send me along The path that leads to the grove of the Furies? I followed the path and I tell you this: On the way to the grove you’ll pass the Fates, Shadow-eyed, bent over their weaving. Stop for a moment, and if you see The thread of revenge leap out of the shuttle Then quickly snatch from Atropos The shears and cut it, lest your sons, And the children of them and their children Wear the envenomed robe.
PERRY ZOLL
My thanks, friends of the County Scientific Association, For this modest boulder, And its little tablet of bronze. Twice I tried to join your honored body, And was rejected, And when my little brochure On the intelligence of plants Began to attract attention You almost voted me in. After that I grew beyond the need of you And your recognition. Yet I do not reject your memorial stone, Seeing that I should, in so doing, Deprive you of honor to yourselves.
ARCHIBALD HIGBIE
I loathed you, Spoon River. I tried to rise above you, I was ashamed of you. I despised you As the place of my nativity. And there in Rome, among the artists, Speaking Italian, speaking French, I seemed to myself at times to be free Of every trace of my origin. I seemed to be reaching the heights of art And to breathe the air that the masters breathed, And to see the world with their eyes. But still they’d pass my work and say: “What are you driving at, my friend? Sometimes the face looks like Apollo’s, At others it has a trace of Lincoln’s.” There was no culture, you know, in Spoon River, And I burned with shame and held my peace. And what could I do, all covered over And weighted down with western soil, Except aspire, and pray for another Birth in the world, with all of Spoon River Rooted out of my soul?
FATHER MALLOY
You are over there, Father Malloy, Where holy ground is, and the cross marks every grave, Not here with us on the hill— Us of wavering faith, and clouded vision And drifting hope, and unforgiven sins. You were so human, Father Malloy, Taking a friendly glass sometimes with us, Siding with us who would rescue Spoon River From the coldness and the dreariness of village morality. You were like a traveler who brings a little box of sand From the wastes about the pyramids And makes them real and Egypt real. You were a part of and related to a great past, And yet you were so close to many of us. You believed in the joy of life. You did not seem to be ashamed of the flesh. You faced life as it is, And as it changes. Some of us almost came to you, Father Malloy, Seeing how your church had divined the heart, And provided for it, Through Peter the Flame, Peter the Rock.
LUCINDA MATLOCK
I went to the dances at Chandlerville, And played snap-out at Winchester. One time we changed partners, Driving home in the moonlight of middle June, And then I found Davis. We were married and lived together for seventy years, Enjoying, working, raising the twelve children, Eight of whom we lost Ere I had reached the age of sixty. I spun, I wove, I kept the house, I nursed the sick, I made the garden, and for holiday Rambled over the fields where sang the larks, And by Spoon River gathering many a shell, And many a flower and medicinal weed— Shouting to the wooded hills, singing to the green valleys. At ninety-six I had lived enough, that is all, And passed to a sweet repose. What is this I hear of sorrow and weariness, Anger, discontent and drooping hopes? Degenerate sons and daughters, Life is too strong for you— It takes life to love Life.
ANNE RUTLEDGE
Out of me unworthy and unknown The vibrations of deathless music; “With malice toward none, with charity for all.” Out of me the forgiveness of millions toward millions, And the beneficent face of a nation Shining with justice and truth. I am Anne Rutledge who sleep beneath these weeds, Beloved in life of Abraham Lincoln, Wedded to him, not through union, But through separation. Bloom forever, O Republic, From the dust of my bosom!
WILLIAM H. HERNDON
There by the window in the old house Perched on the bluff, overlooking miles of valley, My days of labor closed, sitting out life’s decline, Day by day did I look in my memory, As one who gazes in an enchantress’ crystal globe, And I saw the figures of the past, As if in a pageant glassed by a shining dream, Move through the incredible sphere of time. And I saw a man arise from the soil like a fabled giant And throw himself over a deathless destiny, Master of great armies, head of the republic, Bringing together into a dithyramb of recreative song The epic hopes of a people; At the same time Vulcan of sovereign fires, Where imperishable shields and swords were beaten out From spirits tempered in heaven. Look in the crystal! See how he hastens on To the place where his path comes up to the path Of a child of Plutarch and Shakespeare. O Lincoln, actor indeed, playing well your part, And Booth, who strode in a mimic play within the play, Often and often I saw you, As the cawing crows winged their way to the wood Over my house-top at solemn sunsets, There by my window, Alone.
RUTHERFORD M^cDOWELL
They brought me ambrotypes Of the old pioneers to enlarge. And sometimes one sat for me— Some one who was in being When giant hands from the womb of the world Tore the republic. What was it in their eyes?— For I could never fathom That mystical pathos of drooped eyelids, And the serene sorrow of their eyes. It was like a pool of water, Amid oak trees at the edge of a forest, Where the leaves fall, As you hear the crow of a cock From a far-off farm house, seen near the hills Where the third generation lives, and the strong men And the strong women are gone and forgotten. And these grand-children and great grand-children Of the pioneers!— Truly did my camera record their faces, too, With so much of the old strength gone, And the old faith gone, And the old mastery of life gone, And the old courage gone, Which labors and loves and suffers and sings Under the sun!
ARLO WILL
Did you ever see an alligator Come up to the air from the mud, Staring blindly under the full glare of noon? Have you seen the stabled horses at night Tremble and start back at the sight of a lantern? Have you ever walked in darkness When an unknown door was open before you And you stood, it seemed, in the light of a thousand candles Of delicate wax? Have you walked with the wind in your ears And the sunlight about you And found it suddenly shine with an inner splendor? Out of the mud many times, Before many doors of light, Through many fields of splendor, Where around your steps a soundless glory scatters Like new-fallen snow, Will you go through earth, O strong of soul, And through unnumbered heavens To the final flame!
AARON HATFIELD