Edgar Lee Masters (1868-1950)
Conrad Siever
1Not in that wasted garden
2Where bodies are drawn into grass
3That feeds no flocks, and into evergreens
4That bear no fruit --
5There where along the shaded walks
6Vain sighs are heard,
7And vainer dreams are dreamed
8Of close communion with departed souls --
9But here under the apple tree
10I loved and watched and pruned
11With gnarled hands
12In the long, long years;
13Here under the roots of this northern-spy
14To move in the chemic change and circle of life,
15Into the soil and into the flesh of the tree,
16And into the living epitaphs
17Of redder apples!
Notes
13] northern-spy: a variety of apple tree.
Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.
Original text: Edgar Lee Masters, Spoon River Anthology,
illustrated by Oliver Herford (London: T. Werner Laurie,
[1916]): 31. 8-NBI Masters New York Public Library
First publication date:
1915
RPO poem editor: Ian Lancashire
RP edition: 2003
Recent editing: 1:2003/6/2
Rhyme: unrhyming
Other poems by Edgar Lee Masters
