The Great Valley

by Edgar Lee Masters

Dim, mid the hillside’s shadow grass
I count the marble slabs. How vain
My throbbing life that waits to pass
Into the great world on the train!

The city’s vision fades from mind.
I only see the hill and sky;
And on the mist that rides the wind
A tottering pageant meets my eye.

The cock crows faintly, far away;
A troop of age and grief appears.
Ye shadows of a distant day.
What do ye, pioneers?

There shines the engine’s comet light.
Ye shadows of a century set,
Haste to the hillside and the night—
I am not of you yet!

ROBERT G. INGERSOLL

To the lovers of Liberty everywhere,
But chiefly to the youth of America
Who did not know Robert G. Ingersoll,
Remember that he helped to make you free!
He was a leader in a war of guns for freedom,
But a general in the war of ideas for freedom!
He braved the misunderstanding of friends,
He faced the enmity of the powerful small of soul,
And the insidious power of the churches;
He put aside worldly honours,
And the sovereignty of place,
He stripped off the armor of institutional friendships
To dedicate his soul
To the terrible deities of Truth and Beauty!
And he went down into age and into the shadow
With love of men for a staff,
And the light of his soul for a light—
And with these alone!
O you martyrs trading martyrdom for heaven,
And self-denial for eternal riches,
How does your work and your death compare
With a man’s for whom the weal of the race,
And the cause of humanity here and now were enough
To give life meaning and death as well?—
I have not seen such faith in Israel!

AT HAVANA

I met a fisherman at Havana once,
Havana on the Illinois, I mean,
There by the house and fish boats. He was burned
The color of an acorn, and his hair
Was coarse as a horse’s tail. His scraggy hands
Looked like thick bands of weather-colored copper,
But his eyes were blue as faded gingham is.
I stood amid the smell of scales and heads,
And fishes’ entrails dumped along the sand.
The still air was a burning glass which focused
A bon-fire sun right through my leghorn hat;
And a black fly from crannies of the air
Lit on my hand and bit it venomously.
Across the yellow river lay the bottoms
Where giant sycamores and elms o’ertopped
A jungle of disgusting weeds. The breeze
Hot as a tropic breath exhaled the reek
Of baking mud and of those noisome weeds,
Wherewith the odors of putrescent fish
Mixed on the simmering sands. A naturalist
Must seek the habitat of the life he studies....
There on a platform lay the dressed fish, carp,
Black-bass, and pike and pickerel, buffalo,
Cat-fish, which I had come to see, and talk
With fishermen along the Illinois.
My man held up a fish and said to me;
“Here is the bastard who drives all the fish
Out of the river, out of any water
He comes in, and he comes wherever food
Can be obtained; the black-bass, even cat-fish,
And all the good stocks run away from him,
He is so hoggish, plaguy, and so mean.
The other fish may try to live with him,
I’m thinking sometimes, anyway I know
He drives the others out.” I looked to see
What fish is so unfriendly to his fellows.
“Just look at him,” he said, but as he spoke
The black fly stung my hand again. When I
Looked up from swatting him, the man had thrown
The fish upon the sand, and a stray dog
Was running off with him along the river.

THE MOURNER’S BENCH

They’re holding a revival at New Hope Meeting house,
I can’t keep from going, I ought to stay away.
For I come home and toss in bed till day,
For thinking of my sin, and the trouble I am in.
I dream I hear the dancers
In the steps and swings,
The quadrilles and the lancers
They danced at Revis Springs.
I lie and think of Charley, Charley, Charley
The Bobtown dandy
Who had his way with me.
And no one is so handy
A dancer as Charley
To Little Drops of Brandy,
Or the Wind that Shakes the Barley,
Or Good mornin’ Uncle Johnny I’ve fetched your Wagon Home.