Four Poems

The Little ReviewVOL. IIIAPRIL, 1916NO. 2Copyright, 1916, by Margaret C. Anderson

The Little Review

VOL. IIIAPRIL, 1916NO. 2

VOL. IIIAPRIL, 1916NO. 2

VOL. III

APRIL, 1916

NO. 2

Copyright, 1916, by Margaret C. Anderson

CARL SANDBURG

Everybody loved Chick Lorimer in our town.Far offEverybody loved her.So we all love a wild girl keeping a holdOn a dream she wants.Nobody knows now where Chick Lorimer went.Nobody knows why she packed her trunk: a few old thingsAnd is gone....Gone with her little chinThrust ahead of herAnd her soft hair blowing carelessFrom under a wide hat,Dancer, singer, a laughing passionate lover.Were there ten men or a hundred hunting Chick?Were there five men or fifty with aching hearts?Everybody loved Chick Lorimer.Nobody knows where she’s gone.

Everybody loved Chick Lorimer in our town.Far offEverybody loved her.So we all love a wild girl keeping a holdOn a dream she wants.Nobody knows now where Chick Lorimer went.Nobody knows why she packed her trunk: a few old thingsAnd is gone....Gone with her little chinThrust ahead of herAnd her soft hair blowing carelessFrom under a wide hat,Dancer, singer, a laughing passionate lover.Were there ten men or a hundred hunting Chick?Were there five men or fifty with aching hearts?Everybody loved Chick Lorimer.Nobody knows where she’s gone.

Everybody loved Chick Lorimer in our town.Far offEverybody loved her.So we all love a wild girl keeping a holdOn a dream she wants.Nobody knows now where Chick Lorimer went.Nobody knows why she packed her trunk: a few old thingsAnd is gone....Gone with her little chinThrust ahead of herAnd her soft hair blowing carelessFrom under a wide hat,Dancer, singer, a laughing passionate lover.

Everybody loved Chick Lorimer in our town.

Far off

Everybody loved her.

So we all love a wild girl keeping a hold

On a dream she wants.

Nobody knows now where Chick Lorimer went.

Nobody knows why she packed her trunk: a few old things

And is gone....

Gone with her little chin

Thrust ahead of her

And her soft hair blowing careless

From under a wide hat,

Dancer, singer, a laughing passionate lover.

Were there ten men or a hundred hunting Chick?Were there five men or fifty with aching hearts?Everybody loved Chick Lorimer.Nobody knows where she’s gone.

Were there ten men or a hundred hunting Chick?

Were there five men or fifty with aching hearts?

Everybody loved Chick Lorimer.

Nobody knows where she’s gone.

I dreamed one man stood against a thousand,One man damned as a wrongheaded fool.One year and another he walked the streets,And a thousand shrugs and hootsMet him in the shoulders and mouths he passed.He died aloneAnd only the undertaker came to his funeral.Flowers grow over his grave anod in the wind,And over the graves of the thousand, too,The flowers grow anod in the wind.Flowers and the wind,Flowers anod over the graves of the dead,Petals of red, leaves of yellow, streaks of white,Masses of purple sagging ...I love you and your great way of forgetting.

I dreamed one man stood against a thousand,One man damned as a wrongheaded fool.One year and another he walked the streets,And a thousand shrugs and hootsMet him in the shoulders and mouths he passed.He died aloneAnd only the undertaker came to his funeral.Flowers grow over his grave anod in the wind,And over the graves of the thousand, too,The flowers grow anod in the wind.Flowers and the wind,Flowers anod over the graves of the dead,Petals of red, leaves of yellow, streaks of white,Masses of purple sagging ...I love you and your great way of forgetting.

I dreamed one man stood against a thousand,One man damned as a wrongheaded fool.One year and another he walked the streets,And a thousand shrugs and hootsMet him in the shoulders and mouths he passed.

I dreamed one man stood against a thousand,

One man damned as a wrongheaded fool.

One year and another he walked the streets,

And a thousand shrugs and hoots

Met him in the shoulders and mouths he passed.

He died aloneAnd only the undertaker came to his funeral.

He died alone

And only the undertaker came to his funeral.

Flowers grow over his grave anod in the wind,And over the graves of the thousand, too,The flowers grow anod in the wind.

Flowers grow over his grave anod in the wind,

And over the graves of the thousand, too,

The flowers grow anod in the wind.

Flowers and the wind,Flowers anod over the graves of the dead,Petals of red, leaves of yellow, streaks of white,Masses of purple sagging ...I love you and your great way of forgetting.

Flowers and the wind,

Flowers anod over the graves of the dead,

Petals of red, leaves of yellow, streaks of white,

Masses of purple sagging ...

I love you and your great way of forgetting.

They offer you many things,I a few.Moonlight on the play of fountains at nightWith water sparkling a drowsy monotone,Bare-shouldered, smiling women and talkAnd a cross-play of loves and adulteriesAnd a fear of deathand a remembering of regrets:All this they offer you.I come with:salt and breada terrible job of workand tireless war;Come and have now:hungerdangerand hate.

They offer you many things,I a few.Moonlight on the play of fountains at nightWith water sparkling a drowsy monotone,Bare-shouldered, smiling women and talkAnd a cross-play of loves and adulteriesAnd a fear of deathand a remembering of regrets:All this they offer you.I come with:salt and breada terrible job of workand tireless war;Come and have now:hungerdangerand hate.

They offer you many things,I a few.Moonlight on the play of fountains at nightWith water sparkling a drowsy monotone,Bare-shouldered, smiling women and talkAnd a cross-play of loves and adulteriesAnd a fear of deathand a remembering of regrets:All this they offer you.I come with:salt and breada terrible job of workand tireless war;Come and have now:hungerdangerand hate.

They offer you many things,

I a few.

Moonlight on the play of fountains at night

With water sparkling a drowsy monotone,

Bare-shouldered, smiling women and talk

And a cross-play of loves and adulteries

And a fear of death

and a remembering of regrets:

All this they offer you.

I come with:

salt and bread

a terrible job of work

and tireless war;

Come and have now:

hunger

danger

and hate.

Carl SandburgFrom a silhouette photograph by Elizabeth Buehrmann

Carl SandburgFrom a silhouette photograph by Elizabeth Buehrmann

The dago shovelman sits by the railroad trackEating a noon meal of bread and bologna.A train whirls by and men and women at tablesAlive with red roses and yellow jonquils,Eat steaks running with brown gravy,Strawberries and cream, eclairs and coffee.The dago shovelman finishes the dry bread and bologna,Washes it down with a dipper from the water-boyAnd goes back to the second half of a ten-hour day’s work,Keeping the road-bed so the roses and jonquilsShake hardly at all in the cut glass vasesStanding slender on the tables in the dining cars.

The dago shovelman sits by the railroad trackEating a noon meal of bread and bologna.A train whirls by and men and women at tablesAlive with red roses and yellow jonquils,Eat steaks running with brown gravy,Strawberries and cream, eclairs and coffee.The dago shovelman finishes the dry bread and bologna,Washes it down with a dipper from the water-boyAnd goes back to the second half of a ten-hour day’s work,Keeping the road-bed so the roses and jonquilsShake hardly at all in the cut glass vasesStanding slender on the tables in the dining cars.

The dago shovelman sits by the railroad trackEating a noon meal of bread and bologna.A train whirls by and men and women at tablesAlive with red roses and yellow jonquils,Eat steaks running with brown gravy,Strawberries and cream, eclairs and coffee.The dago shovelman finishes the dry bread and bologna,Washes it down with a dipper from the water-boyAnd goes back to the second half of a ten-hour day’s work,Keeping the road-bed so the roses and jonquilsShake hardly at all in the cut glass vasesStanding slender on the tables in the dining cars.

The dago shovelman sits by the railroad track

Eating a noon meal of bread and bologna.

A train whirls by and men and women at tables

Alive with red roses and yellow jonquils,

Eat steaks running with brown gravy,

Strawberries and cream, eclairs and coffee.

The dago shovelman finishes the dry bread and bologna,

Washes it down with a dipper from the water-boy

And goes back to the second half of a ten-hour day’s work,

Keeping the road-bed so the roses and jonquils

Shake hardly at all in the cut glass vases

Standing slender on the tables in the dining cars.


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