Friday, November 4, 2016

Lucinda Matlock by Edgar Lee Masters

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 had 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 gathering 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 a 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.

In order to get a job teaching high school, I exaggerated my experience in theater and found myself not just teaching six classes a day, but also directing the school's fall drama and spring musical.  Initially, I was in a bit over my head, but I figured it out.

My directorial debut was "Spoon River Anthology" by Masters, a collection of his poems about people in a particular Illinois town, as based upon their tombstones, rendered in dramatic form.  I remember in particular this one, as I had somehow to coach a performance from the school's head cheerleader, who was anything but a 94-year-old widow.  To her credit, she did a fine job.

Also, "It takes life to love Life" is a fine philosophy.