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by Carl Sandburg (1878 - 1967)

Still Life
Language: English 
Cool your heels on the rail of an observation car.
Let the engineer open her up for ninety miles an hour.
Take in the prairie right and left, rolling land 
and new hay crops, swaths of new hay laid in the sun.
A gray village flecks by and the horses hitched 
in front of the post-office never blink an eye.
A barnyard and fifteen Holstein cows, dabs of white 
on a black wall map, never blink an eye.
A signalman in a tower, the outpost of Kansas City, 
keeps his place at a window with the serenity of a bronze statue 
on a dark night when lovers pass whispering.

Text Authorship:

  • by Carl Sandburg (1878 - 1967), "Still Life", appears in Cornhuskers, first published 1918 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

  • by Howard Swanson (1907 - 1978), "Still Life", published 1950 [ medium voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2007-07-08
Line count: 11
Word count: 109

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