Spoon River Anthology

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?

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.

Together in this grave lie Benjamin Pantier, attorney at law, And Nig, his dog, constant companion, solace and friend. Down the gray road, friends, children, men and women, Passing one by one out of life, left me till I was alone With Nig for partner, bed-fellow, comrade in drink. In the morning of life I knew aspiration and saw glory, Then she, who survives me, snared my soul With a snare which bled me to death, Till I, once strong of will, lay broken, indifferent, Living with Nig in a room back of a dingy office. Under my jawbone is snuggled the bony nose of Nig⁠— Our story is lost in silence. Go by, mad world!

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 someone 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.