There was a hazy sky, a few stars

Which I followed as best I could.

 

 

 

 

It was nine o’clock, I was trying to get home.

But somehow I was lost,

Though really keeping the road.

 

 

 

 

Then I reeled through a gate and into a yard,

And called at the top of my voice:

“Oh, Fiddler! Oh, Mr. Jones!”

(I thought it was his house and he would show me the way home.)

 

 

 

 

But who should step out but A. D. Blood,

In his night shirt, waving a stick of wood,

And roaring about the cursed saloons,

And the criminals they made?

 

 

 

 

“You drunken Oscar Hummel,” he said,

As I stood there weaving to and fro,

Taking the blows from the stick in his hand

Till I dropped down dead at his feet.

 

 

 

 

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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.

 

 

 

 

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“Oscar Hummel”,

 

“Ollie McGee”

 

from Spoon River Anthology, Edgar Lee Masters,  (New York: Macmillan, 1916)

 

Farmersville, eh?

 

Actually, it looks like a smaller West Milton (I know, West Milton isn't exactly "large" but if you go there, you'll see what I mean).

I like the graveyard and the barn.

Neat thread; the b&w  images really carry the theme of the poems.

 

Reading them, I was reminded of a former neighbor of ours who died in her 70s after a life made miserable by a mean drunk of a husband. The sentiment expressed by many who knew her was that at least the old bastard could have died first, and given her a few years of peace. I don't think anyone lamented his passing when at last he went to the grave -- not even his children.

Actually, it looks like a smaller West Milton (I know, West Milton isn't exactly "large" but if you go there, you'll see what I mean).

 

I think of Farmersville as a budget version of Germantown.  This is sort of an artsy look, using the place as a stand-in for something else, but its worth a "straight" pix set someday.  Ive always had a feel for those country towns in western Montg. County.

 

neat thread; the b&w  images really carry the theme of the poems...

 

Yeah, I was trying to work on feel here.  The poem selection from Spoon River is not by me but from album by a country-folk-rock musician setting selected poems to music, so i was working with the feell of the music as much as the words (but he did pick some of the stronger ones).

 

Incidentally, googling the subject, I found out that someone already did this...an Italian and an American did a book of photos and poems called Ciao Spoon River, of the countryside and towns Masters was from.

 

I was reminded of a former neighbor of ours who died in her 70s after a life made miserable by a mean drunk of a husband. The sentiment expressed by many who knew her was that at least the old bastard could have died first, and given her a few years of peace. I don't think anyone lamented his passing when at last he went to the grave -- not even his children.

 

All sorts of storys like this in small towns. 

 

I'm not sure how well known Spoon River Antholgy is outside of lit circles.  I never studied it in school and came across it by accident (so it was quite a shock finding out a pop muscian based an album on it).  The better poems are a good example of what looks simple (free verse) really isn't.  I just like the stark, flat tone/plain speech of the poems.