The Hill

(181. Tom Merritt)
At first I suspected something—
She acted so calm and absent-minded
And one day I heard the back door shut
As I entered the front, and I saw him slink
Back of the smokehouse into the lot
And run across the field
And I meant to kill him on sight
But that day, walking near Fourth Bridge
Without a stick or a stone at hand
All of a sudden I saw him standing
Scared to death, holding his rabbits
And all I could say was, "Don't, Don't, Don't,"
As he aimed and fired at my heart
(3. Ollie Mc
Gee)
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
(36. 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
I thought over the last letter written me
By that estranged young soul
Whose betrayal of me I had concealed
By marrying the old man
Then I took morphine and sat down to read
Across the blackness that came over my eyes
I see the flickering light of these words even now:
"And Jesus said unto him, Verily
I say unto thee, To-day thou shalt
Be with me in paradise."
(184. Elizabeth Childers)
Dust of my dust
And dust with my dust
O, child who died as you entered the world
Dead with my death!
Not knowing Breath, though you tried so hard
With a heart that beat when you lived with me
And stopped when you left me for Life
It is well, my child. For you never traveled
The long, long way that begins with school days
When little fingers blur under the tears
That fall on the crooked letters
And the earliest wound, when a little mate
Leaves you alone for another;
And sickness, and the face of Fear by the bed;
The death of a father or mother;
Or shame for them, or poverty;
The maiden sorrow of school days ended;
And eyeless Nature that makes you drink
From the cup of Love, though you know it's poisoned;
To whom would your flower-face have been lifted?
Botanist, weakling? Cry of what blood to yours?—
Pure or foul, for it makes no matter
It's blood that calls to our blood
And then your children—oh, what might they be?
And what your sorrow? Child! Child!
Death is better than Life!
(134. Oscar Hummel)
I staggered on through darkness
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
(37. Johnnie Sayre)
Father, thou canst never know
The anguish that smote my heart
For my disobedience, the moment I felt
The remorseless wheel of the engine
Sink into the crying flesh of my leg
As they carried me to the home of widow Morris
I could see the school-house in the valley
To which I played truant to steal rides upon the trains
I prayed to live until I could ask your forgiveness—
And then your tears, your broken words of comfort!
From the solace of that hour I have gained infinite happiness
Thou wert wise to chisel for me:
"Taken from the evil to come."
(16. Reuben Pantier)
Well, Emily Sparks, your prayers were not wasted
Your love was not all in vain
I owe whatever I was in life
To your hope that would not give me up
To your love that saw me still as good
Dear Emily Sparks, let me tell you the story
I pass the effect of my father and mother;
The milliner's daughter made me trouble
And out I went in the world
Where I passed through every peril known
Of wine and women and joy of life
One night, in a room in the Rue de Rivoli
I was drinking wine with a black-eyed cocotte
And the tears swam into my eyes
She thought they were amorous tears and smiled
For thought of her conquest over me
But my soul was three thousand miles away
In the days when you taught me in Spoon River
And just because you no more could love me
Nor pray for me, nor write me letters
The eternal silence of you spoke instead
And the black-eyed cocotte took the tears for hers
As well as the deceiving kisses I gave her
Somehow, from that hour, I had a new vision—
Dear Emily Sparks!
(8. Amanda Barker)
Henry got me with child
Knowing that I could not bring forth life
Without losing my own
In my youth therefore I entered the portals of dust
Traveler, it is believed in the village where I lived
That Henry loved me with a husband's love
But I proclaim from the dust
That he slew me to gratify his hatred
(72. William and Emily)
There is something about Death
Like love itself!
If with some one with whom you have known passion
And the glow of youthful love
You also, after years of life
Together, feel the sinking of the fire
And thus fade away together
Gradually, faintly, delicately
As it were in each other's arms
Passing from the familiar room—
That is a power of unison between souls
Like love itself!