Mrs. MerrittSilent before the juryReturning no word to the judge when he asked meIf I had aught to say against the sentence,Only shaking my head.What could I say to people who thoughtThat a woman of thirty-five was at faultWhen her lover of nineteen killed her husband?Even though she had said to him over and over,“Go away, Elmer, go far away,I have maddened your brain with the gift of my body:You will do some terrible thing.”And just as I feared, he killed my husband;With which I had nothing to do, beforeGod Silent for thirty years in prisonAnd the iron gates of JolietSwung as the gray and silent trustiesCarried me out in a coffin.
Silent before the juryReturning no word to the judge when he asked meIf I had aught to say against the sentence,Only shaking my head.What could I say to people who thoughtThat a woman of thirty-five was at faultWhen her lover of nineteen killed her husband?Even though she had said to him over and over,“Go away, Elmer, go far away,I have maddened your brain with the gift of my body:You will do some terrible thing.”And just as I feared, he killed my husband;With which I had nothing to do, beforeGod Silent for thirty years in prisonAnd the iron gates of JolietSwung as the gray and silent trustiesCarried me out in a coffin.