(no subject)

[mynewplace]

Another in the style of The Spoon River Anthology.  Brent suggested this one, and it's taken me quite a while to write it. Once I started googling, the words became clear.

 

In Memory of Elizabeth Reed

1845-1935

 

My name is Elizabeth Reed

Has been and always will be

In some form or another

I have been Esther

And Sarah and Carrie

I am a doctor

An author – a storyteller

A Teacher of teachers

A reverend deaconess

But merely a vessel.

I have gained such knowledge in my lives

Of blood, of brain,

Of Hindu and Persian tale

Of Chinese lore.

In 1845 they called me Betsey

When I was married to an evil man in Crawford County.

I sang on the way to my hanging

The first and only woman to swing

In Illinois, because I served my evil man

Sassafras tea, with a little arsenic.

 

Last time Dickey Betts merely called me Elizabeth Reed.

A fine Georgia woman, beloved and remembered,

Honored in soaring music, which I hear from time to time

AsRose Hill is blanketed with the beautiful strains

Of the tune that bears my name.

You see they laid Duane here in seventy-one

And Berry in seventy-two.

Now a tall, hard man wanders the rows

And as he nears them

A glorious golden thread fills the ether-world

Spidering toward every source of music within range

Spirits rise, join in

And the web vibrates

With the music of their souls.

Sometimes I wonder if the tall man can hear it

But mostly I just lie here

And bask in the glow of recognition.

Waiting for the next

Elizabeth Reed.