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.
Songs from Spoon River
Song Cycle by Andrew Downes (1950 - 2023)
1. Ollie McGee  [sung text checked 1 time]
Authorship:
- by Edgar Lee Masters (1868 - 1950), "Ollie McGee", appears in Spoon River Anthology, first published 1916
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Confirmed with Edgar Lee Masters, Spoon River Anthology, New York: The Macmillan Company, 1921, page 4.
Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Poom Andrew Pipatjarasgit [Guest Editor]
2. Russian Sonia  [sung text checked 1 time]
I, born in Weimar Of a mother who was French And German father, a most learned professor, Orphaned at fourteen years, Became a dancer, known as Russian Sonia, All up and down the boulevards of Paris, Mistress betimes of sundry dukes and counts, And later of poor artists and of poets. At forty years, passée, I sought New York And met old Patrick Hummer on the boat, Red-faced and hale, though turned his sixtieth year, Returning after having sold a ship-load Of cattle in the German city, Hamburg. He brought me to Spoon River and we lived here For twenty years--they thought that we were married! This oak tree near me is the favorite haunt Of blue jays chattering, chattering all the day. And why not? for my very dust is laughing For thinking of the humorous thing called life.
Authorship:
- by Edgar Lee Masters (1868 - 1950), "Russian Sonia", appears in Spoon River Anthology, first published 1916
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Confirmed with Edgar Lee Masters, Spoon River Anthology, New York: The Macmillan Company, 1921, page 86.
Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Poom Andrew Pipatjarasgit [Guest Editor]
3. Rebecca Wasson  [sung text checked 1 time]
Spring and Summer, Fall and Winter and Spring, After each other drifting, past my window drifting! And I lay so many years watching them drift and counting The years till a terror came in my heart at times, With the feeling that I had become eternal; at last My hundredth year was reached! And still I lay Hearing the tick of the clock, and the low of cattle And the scream of a jay flying through falling leaves! Day after day alone in a room of the house Of a daughter-in-law stricken with age and gray. And by night, or looking out of the window by day My thought ran back, it seemed, through infinite time To North Carolina and all my girlhood days, And John, my John, away to the war with the British, And all the children, the deaths, and all the sorrows. And that stretch of years like a prairie in Illinois Through which great figures passed like hurrying horsemen, Washington, Jefferson, Jackson, Webster, Clay. O beautiful young republic for whom my John and I Gave all of our strength and love! And O my John! Why, when I lay so helpless in bed for years, Praying for you to come, was your coming delayed? Seeing that with a cry of rapture, like that I uttered When you found me in old Virginia after the war, I cried when I beheld you there by the bed, As the sun stood low in the west growing smaller and fainter In the light of your face!
Authorship:
- by Edgar Lee Masters (1868 - 1950), "Rebecca Wasson", appears in Spoon River Anthology, first published 1916
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Confirmed with Edgar Lee Masters, Spoon River Anthology, New York: The Macmillan Company, 1921, page 226-227.
Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Poom Andrew Pipatjarasgit [Guest Editor]
4. Dora Williams  [sung text checked 1 time]
When Reuben Pantier ran away and threw me I went to Springfield. There I met a lush, Whose father just deceased left him a fortune. He married me when drunk. My life was wretched. A year passed and one day they found him dead. That made me rich. I moved on to Chicago. After a time met Tyler Rountree, villain. I moved on to New York. A gray-haired magnate Went mad about me -- so another fortune. He died one night right in my arms, you know. (I saw his purple face for years thereafter.) There was almost a scandal. I moved on, This time to Paris. I was now a woman, Insidious, subtle, versed in the world and rich. My sweet apartment near the Champs Élysées Became a center for all sorts of people, Musicians, poets, dandies, artists, nobles, Where we spoke French and German, Italian, English. I wed Count Navigato, native of Genoa. We went to Rome. He poisoned me, I think. Now in the Campo Santo overlooking The sea where young Columbus dreamed new worlds, See what they chiseled: "Contessa Navigato Implora eterna quiete."
Authorship:
- by Edgar Lee Masters (1868 - 1950), "Dora Williams", appears in Spoon River Anthology, first published 1916
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Confirmed with Edgar Lee Masters, Spoon River Anthology, New York: The Macmillan Company, 1921, page 71.
Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Poom Andrew Pipatjarasgit [Guest Editor]
5. Sarah Brown  [sung text checked 1 time]
Maurice, weep not, I am not here under this pine tree. The balmy air of spring whispers through the sweet grass, The stars sparkle, the whippoorwill calls, But thou grievest, while my soul lies rapturous In the blest Nirvana of eternal light! Go to the good heart that is my husband, Who broods upon what he calls our guilty love: -- Tell him that my love for you, no less than my love for him, Wrought out my destiny -- that through the flesh I won spirit, and through spirit, peace. There is no marriage in heaven, But there is love.
Authorship:
- by Edgar Lee Masters (1868 - 1950), "Sarah Brown", appears in Spoon River Anthology, first published 1916
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Confirmed with Edgar Lee Masters, Spoon River Anthology, New York: The Macmillan Company, 1921, page 34.
Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Poom Andrew Pipatjarasgit [Guest Editor]