Sunday in the Cemetery

I went to the dances at Chandlerville,
And played snap-out at Winchester.
One time we changed partners,
Driving home in the moonlight of middle June,
And then I found Davis.





We were married and lived together for seventy years,
Enjoying, working, raising the twelve children,



















Eight of whom we lost
Ere I
reached the age of sixty.










I spun, I wove, I kept the house, I nursed the sick,
I made the garden, and for holiday
Rambled over the fields where sang the larks,
And by Spoon River gathered many a shell,







And many a flower and medicinal weed --
Shouting to the wooded hills, singing to the green valleys.
At ninety-six I had lived enough, that is all,
And passed to sweet repose.










What is this I hear of sorrow and weariness,
Anger, discontent and drooping hopes?
Degenerate sons and daughters,











Life is too strong for you --
It takes life to love Life.

"Lucinda Matlock," Spoon River Anthology
by Edgar Lee Masters