Lucinda Matlock

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.