Henry C. Calhoun

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1. Henry Tripp The bank broke and I lost my savings. I was sick of the tiresome game in Spoon River And I made up my mind to run away And leave my place in life and my family; But just as the midnight train pulled in, Quick off the steps jumped Cully Green And Martin Vise, and […]...
2. Granville Calhoun I wanted to be County Judge One more term, so as to round out a service Of thirty years. But my friends left me and joined my enemies, And they elected a new man. Then a spirit of revenge seized me, And I infected my four sons with it, And I brooded upon retaliation, Until […]...
3. Archibald Higbie I loathed you, Spoon River. I tried to rise above you, I was ashamed of you. I despised you As the place of my nativity. And there in Rome, among the artists, Speaking Italian, speaking French, I seemed to myself at times to be free Of every trace of my origin. I seemed to be […]...
4. Mrs. Williams I was the milliner Talked about, lied about, Mother of Dora, Whose strange disappearance Was charged to her rearing. My eye quick to beauty Saw much beside ribbons And buckles and feathers And leghorns and felts, To set off sweet faces, And dark hair and gold. One thing I will tell you And one I […]...
5. Harry Carey Goodhue You never marveled, dullards of Spoon River, When Chase Henry voted against the saloons To revenge himself for being shut off. But none of you was keen enough To follow my steps, or trace me home As Chase’s spiritual brother. Do you remember when I fought The bank and the courthouse ring, For pocketing the […]...
6. The Loom of Dreams I broider the world upon a loom, I broider with dreams my tapestry; Here in a little lonely room I am master of earth and sea, And the planets come to me. I broider my life into the frame, I broider my love, thread upon thread; The world goes by with its glory and shame, […]...
7. Refrain Of all the songs which poets sing The ones which are most sweet Are those which at close intervals A low refrain repeat; Some tender word, some syllable, Over and over, ever and ever, While the song lasts, Altering never, Music if sung, music if said, Subtle like some golden thread A shuttle casts, In […]...
8. Seth Compton When I died, the circulating library Which I built up for Spoon River, And managed for the good of inquiring minds, Was sold at auction on the public square, As if to destroy the last vestige Of my memory and influence. For those of you who could not see the virtue Of knowing Volney’s “Ruins” […]...
9. Ezra Bartlett A chaplain in the army, A chaplain in the prisons, An exhorter in Spoon River, Drunk with divinity, Spoon River Yet bringing poor Eliza Johnson to shame, And myself to scorn and wretchedness. But why will you never see that love of women, And even love of wine, Are the stimulants by which the soul, […]...
10. The Gardener XIX: You Walked You walked by the riverside path With the full pitcher upon your hip. Why did you swiftly turn your face And peep at me through your fluttering Veil? That gleaming look from the dark Came upon me like a breeze that sends A shiver through the rippling water And sweeps away to the shadowy Shore. […]...
11. John Hancock Otis As to democracy, fellow citizens, Are you not prepared to admit That I, who inherited riches and was to the manor born, Was second to none in Spoon River In my devotion to the cause of Liberty? While my contemporary, Anthony Findlay, Born in a shanty and beginning life As a water carrier to the […]...
12. Mabel Osborne Your red blossoms amid green leaves Are drooping, beautiful geranium! But you do not ask for water. You cannot speak! You do not need to speak Everyone knows that you are dying of thirst, Yet they do not bring water! They pass on, saying: “The geranium wants water.” And I, who had happiness to share […]...
13. Dream Song 74: Henry hates the world. What the world to Henry Henry hates the world. What the world to Henry Did will not bear thought. Feeling no pain, Henry stabbed his arm and wrote a letter Explaining how bad it had been In this world. Old yellow, in a gown Might have made a difference, ‘these lower beauties’, And chartreuse could have mattered “Kyoto, Toledo, Benares—the […]...
14. Lucinda Matlock I went to the dances at Chandlerville, And played snap-out at Winchester. One time we changed partners, Driving home in the midnight 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 had reached the […]...
15. Henry the Seventh Henry the Seventh of England Wasn’t out of the Royal top drawer, The only connection of which he could boast, He were King’s nephew’s brother-in-law. It were after the Wars of the Roses That he came to the front, as it were, When on strength of his having slain Richard the Third He put himself […]...
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 […]...
17. Yee Bow They got me into the Sunday-school In Spoon River And tried to get me to drop Confucius for Jesus. I could have been no worse off If I had tried to get them to drop Jesus for Confucius. For, without any warning, as if it were a prank, And sneaking up behind me, Harry Wiley, […]...
18. Wallace Ferguson There at Geneva where Mt. Blanc floated above The wine-hued lake like a cloud, when a breeze was blown Out of an empty sky of blue, and the roaring Rhone Hurried under the bridge through chasms of rock; And the music along the cafés was part of the splendor Of dancing water under a torrent […]...
19. Adam Weirauch I was crushed between Altgeld and Armour. I lost many friends, much time and money Fighting for Altgeld whom Editor Whedon Denounced as the candidate of gamblers and anarchists. Then Armour started to ship dressed meat to Spoon River, Forcing me to shut down my slaughter-house, And my butcher shop went all to pieces. The […]...
20. Walter Simmons My parents thought that I would be As great as Edison or greater: For as a boy I made balloons And wondrous kites and toys with clocks And little engines with tracks to run on And telephones of cans and thread. I played the cornet and painted pictures, Modeled in clay and took the part […]...
21. Mrs. Kessler Mr Kessler, you know, was in the army, And he drew six dollars a month as a pension, And stood on the corner talking politics, Or sat at home reading Grant’s Memoirs; And I supported the family by washing, Learning the secrets of all the people From their curtains, counterpanes, shirts and skirts. For things […]...
22. Eve – Song I span and Eve span A thread to bind the heart of man; But the heart of man was a wandering thing That came and went with little to bring: Nothing he minded what we made, As here he loitered, and there he stayed. I span and Eve span A thread to bind the heart […]...
23. Josiah Tompkins I was well known and much beloved And rich, as fortunes are reckoned In Spoon River, where I had lived and worked. That was the home for me, Though all my children had flown afar- Which is the way of Nature-all but one. The boy, who was the baby, stayed at home, To be my […]...
24. Elliott Hawkins I looked like Abraham Lincoln. I was one of you, Spoon River, in all fellowship, But standing for the rights of property and for order. A regular church attendant, Sometimes appearing in your town meetings to warn you Against the evils of discontent and envy, And to denounce those who tried to destroy the Union, […]...
25. Enoch Dunlap How many times, during the twenty years I was your leader, friends of Spoon River, Did you neglect the convention and caucus, And leave the burden on my hands Of guarding and saving the people’s cause? Sometimes because you were ill; Or your grandmother was ill; Or you drank too much and fell asleep; Or […]...
26. THE SPINNER As I calmly sat and span, Toiling with all zeal, Lo! a young and handsome man Pass’d my spinning-wheel. And he praised, what harm was there? Sweet the things he said Praised my flax-resembling hair, And the even thread. He with this was not content, But must needs do more; And in twain the thread […]...
27. Bedtime Story The moon lies on the river Like a drop of oil. The children come to the banks to be healed Of their wounds and bruises. The fathers who gave them their wounds and bruises Come to be healed of their rage. The mothers grow lovely; their faces soften, The birds in their throats awake. They […]...
28. A Coloured Print by Shokei It winds along the face of a cliff This path which I long to explore, And over it dashes a waterfall, And the air is full of the roar And the thunderous voice of waters which sweep In a silver torrent over some steep. It clears the path with a mighty bound And tumbles below […]...
29. Dream Song 136: While his wife earned the living, Rabbi Henry While his wife earned the living, Rabbi Henry Studied the Torah, writing commentaries More likely to be burnt than printed. It was rumoured that they needed revision. Smiling, kissing, he bent his head not with ‘Please’ But with austere requests barely hinted, Like a dog with a bone he worried the Sacred Book And often […]...
30. Calvin Campbell Ye who are kicking against Fate, Tell me how it is that on this hill-side, Running down to the river, Which fronts the sun and the south-wind, This plant draws from the air and soil Poison and becomes poison ivy? And this plant draws from the same air and soil Sweet elixirs and colors and […]...
31. Dream Song 24: Oh servant Henry lectured till Oh servant Henry lectured till The crows commenced and then He bulbed his voice & lectured on some more. This happened again & again, like war, — The Indian p. a.’s, such as they were, A weapon on his side, for the birds. Vexations held a field-monsoon. He was Introduced, and then he was Summed-up. […]...
32. Dream Song 77: Seedy Henry rose up shy Seedy Henry rose up shy in de world & shaved & swung his barbells, duded Henry up And p. a.’d poor thousands of persons on topics of grand Moment to Henry, ah to those less & none. Wif a book of his in either hand He is stript down to move on. €”Come away, Mr. […]...
33. John Wasson Oh! the dew-wet grass of the meadow in North Carolina Through which Rebecca followed me wailing, wailing, One child in her arms, and three that ran along wailing, Lengthening out the farewell to me off to the war with the British, And then the long, hard years down to the day of Yorktown. And then […]...
34. Jefferson Howard My valiant fight! For I call it valiant, With my father’s beliefs from old Virginia: Hating slavery, but no less war. I, full of spirit, audacity, courage Thrown into life here in Spoon River, With its dominant forces drawn from New England, Republicans, Calvinists, merchants, bankers, Hating me, yet fearing my arm. With wife and […]...
35. Dream Song 16: Henry's pelt was put on sundry walls Henry’s pelt was put on sundry walls Where it did much resemble Henry and Them persons was delighted. Especially his long & glowing tail By all them was admired, and visitors. They whistled: This is it! Golden, whilst your frozen daiquiris Whir at midnight, gleams on you his fur & silky & black. Mission accomplished, […]...
36. Dream Song 59: Henry's Meditation in the Kremlin Down on the cathedrals, as from the Giralda In a land no crueller, and over the walls To domes & river look From Great John’s belfry, Ivan-Veliky, Whose thirty-one are still To hail who storms no father’s throne. Bell, book & cradle rule, in silence. Hour by hour From time to time with holy oil […]...
37. Indian Weavers WEAVERS, weaving at break of day, Why do you weave a garment so gay? . . . Blue as the wing of a halcyon wild, We weave the robes of a new-born child. Weavers, weaving at fall of night, Why do you weave a garment so bright? . . . Like the plumes of a […]...
38. Penniwit, the Artist I lost my patronage in Spoon River From trying to put my mind in the camera To catch the soul of the person. The very best picture I ever took Was of Judge Somers, attorney at law. He sat upright and had me pause Till he got his cross-eye straight. Then when he was ready […]...
39. The Funeral of the Late Prince Henry of Battenberg Alas! Prince Henry of Battenberg is dead! And, I hope, has gone to heaven, its streets to tread, And to sing with God’s saints above, Where all is joy and peace and love. ‘Twas in the year of 1896, and on the 5th of February, Prince Henry was buried at Whippingham – a solemn sight […]...
40. A Tribute to Henry M. Stanley Welcome, thrice welcome, to the city of Dundee, The great African explorer Henry M Stanley, Who went out to Africa its wild regions to explore, And travelled o’er wild and lonely deserts, fatigued and footsore. And what he and his little band suffered will never be forgot, Especially one in particular, Major Edmund Barttelot, Alas! […]...