Julian Scott

    Toward the last
    The truth of others was untruth to me;
    The justice of others injustice to me;
    Their reasons for death, reasons with me for life;
    Their reasons for life, reasons with me for death;
    I would have killed those they saved,
    And save those they killed.
    And I saw how a god, if brought to earth,
    Must act out what he saw and thought,
    And could not live in this world of men
    And act among them side by side
    Without continual clashes.
    The dust's for crawling, heaven's for flying -
    Wherefore, O soul, whose wings are grown,
    Soar upward to the sun!

Edgar Lee Masters

Edgar Lee Masters was an American poet, biographer, and dramatist. Born in Kansas and raised in Illinois, Masters is best known for his collection of poems entitled "Spoon River Anthology" (1915), which is a series of epitaphs of residents of the fictional small town of Spoon River. His works reflect the everyday lives and frustrations of middle America. Masters also practiced law and wrote biographies for historical figures such as Abraham Lincoln and Mark Twain.

Edgar Lee Masters

Lucinda Matlock

Edgar Lee Masters, Simple Poetry

O Glorious France

Edgar Lee Masters, Simple Poetry

John Hancock Otis

Edgar Lee Masters, Simple Poetry

What You Will

Edgar Lee Masters, Simple Poetry

English

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Julia Miller

    We quarreled that morning,
    For he was sixty - five, and I was thirty,
    And I was nervous and heavy with the child
    Whose birth I dreaded.
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Edgar Lee Masters

Thomas Trevelyan

    Reading in Ovid the sorrowful story of Itys,
    Son of the love of Tereus and Procne, slain
    For the guilty passion of Tereus for Philomela,
    The flesh of him served to Tereus by Procne,
    And the wrath of Tereus, the murderess pursuing
    Till the gods made Philomela a nightingale,
    Lute of the rising moon, and Procne a swallow
    Oh livers and artists of Hellas centuries gone,
    Sealing in little thuribles dreams and wisdom,
    Incense beyond all price, forever fragrant,
    A breath whereof makes clear the eyes of the soul
    How I inhaled its sweetness here in Spoon River!
    The thurible opening when I had lived and learned
    How all of us kill the children of love, and all of us,
    Knowing not what we do, devour their flesh;
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Edgar Lee Masters

Jacob Goodpasture

    When Fort Sumter fell and the war came
    I cried out in bitterness of soul:
    "O glorious republic now no more!"
    When they buried my soldier son
    To the call of trumpets and the sound of drums
    My heart broke beneath the weight
    Of eighty years, and I cried:
    "Oh, son who died in a cause unjust!
    In the strife of Freedom slain!"
    And I crept here under the grass.
    And now from the battlements of time, behold:
    Thrice thirty million souls being bound together
    In the love of larger truth,
    Rapt in the expectation of the birth
    Of a new Beauty,
    Sprung from Brotherhood and Wisdom.
    I with eyes of spirit see the Transfiguration
    Before you see it.
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Edgar Lee Masters

Oaks Tutt

    My mother was for woman's rights
    And my father was the rich miller at London Mills.
    I dreamed of the wrongs of the world and wanted to right them.
    When my father died, I set out to see peoples and countries
    In order to learn how to reform the world.
    I traveled through many lands. I saw the ruins of Rome
    And the ruins of Athens, And the ruins of Thebes.
    And I sat by moonlight amid the necropolis of Memphis.
    There I was caught up by wings of flame,
    And a voice from heaven said to me:
    "Injustice, Untruth destroyed them.
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    And I hastened back to Spoon River
    To say farewell to my mother before beginning my work.
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Edgar Lee Masters

Caroline Branson

    With our hearts like drifting suns, had we but walked,
    As often before, the April fields till star - light
    Silkened over with viewless gauze the darkness
    Under the cliff, our trysting place in the wood,
    Where the brook turns! Had we but passed from wooing
    Like notes of music that run together, into winning,
    In the inspired improvisation of love!
    But to put back of us as a canticle ended
    The rapt enchantment of the flesh,
    In which our souls swooned, down, down,
    Where time was not, nor space, nor ourselves -
    Annihilated in love!
    To leave these behind for a room with lamps:
    And to stand with our Secret mocking itself,
    And hiding itself amid flowers and mandolins,
    Stared at by all between salad and coffee....

Edgar Lee Masters

The Helping Hand

    Mother, my head is bloody, my breast is red with scars.
    Well, foolish son, I told you so, why went you to the wars?

    Mother, my soul is crucified, my thirst is past belief.
    How are you crucified, my son, betwixt a thief and thief?

    Mother, I feel the terror and the loveliness of life.
    Tell me of the children, son, and tell me of the wife.

    Mother, your face is but a face among a million more.
    You're standing on the deck, my son, and looking at the shore.

    I lean against the wall, mother, and struggle hard for breath.
    You must have heard the step, my son, of the patrolman Death.

    Mother, my soul is weary, where is the way to God?
    Well, kiss the crucifix, my son, and pass beneath the rod.

Edgar Lee Masters