Henry C. Calhoun
I reached the highest place in Spoon River,But through what bitterness of spirit!The face of my father, sitting speechless,Child-like, watching his canaries,And looking at the court-house windowOf the county judge’s room,And his admonitions to me to seekMy own in life, and punish Spoon RiverTo avenge the wrong the people did him,Filled me with furious energyTo seek for wealth and seek for power.But what did he do but send me alongThe path that leads to the grove of the Furies?I followed the path and I tell you this:On the way to the grove you’ll pass the Fates,Shadow-eyed, bent over their weaving.Stop for a moment, and if you seeThe thread of revenge leap out of the shuttleThen quickly snatch from AtroposThe shears and cut it, lest your sonsAnd the children of them and their childrenWear the envenomed robe.
Words in this poem
- speechless a.
- Destitute or deprived of the faculty of speech.
- county n.
- An earldom; the domain of a count or earl. [F. comt, fr. LL. comitatus. See Count.]
- wealth n.
- Weal; welfare; prosperity; good. [OE. welthe, from wele; cf. D. weelde luxury. See Weal prosperity.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Henry C. Calhoun is in the public domain. This text is taken from Spoon River Anthology, Project Gutenberg ebook #1280; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Edgar Lee Masters, Henry C. Calhoun, in Spoon River Anthology (1915), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1280, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/masters-spoon-river/henry-c-calhoun.html, id L07899.
Form and metre
Henry C. Calhoun is 22 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 77%). 89% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.3 syllables. 12 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 46% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 A------A---B---B------ riverA · spirit · speechless · canaries · window · room · seek · riverA · him · energy · power · alongB · furies · this · fates · weavingB · see · shuttle · atropos · sons · children · robe
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| I reached the highest place in Spoon River, | 10 | ···/˘···/˘ |
| But through what bitterness of spirit! | 9 | ···/˘˘·/˘ |
| The face of my father, sitting speechless, | 10 | ····/˘/˘/˘ |
| Child-like, watching his canaries, | 8 | ··/˘·˘/˘ |
| And looking at the court-house window | 9 | ·/˘····/˘ |
| Of the county judge’s room, | 7 | ··/˘/˘· |
| And his admonitions to me to seek | 10 | ···˘/˘···· |
| My own in life, and punish Spoon River | 10 | ·····/˘·/˘ |
| To avenge the wrong the people did him, | 10 | ·˘/···/˘·· |
| Filled me with furious energy | 10 | ·˘··/˘˘/˘˘ |
| To seek for wealth and seek for power. | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| But what did he do but send me along | 10 | ········˘/ |
| The path that leads to the grove of the Furies? | 11 | ·········/˘ |
| I followed the path and I tell you this: | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| On the way to the grove you’ll pass the Fates, | 10 | ·········· |
| Shadow-eyed, bent over their weaving. | 9 | /······/˘ |
| Stop for a moment, and if you see | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| The thread of revenge leap out of the shuttle | 11 | ···˘/····/˘ |
| Then quickly snatch from Atropos | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| The shears and cut it, lest your sons | 8 | ········ |
| And the children of them and their children | 10 | ··/˘····/˘ |
| Wear the envenomed robe. | 6 | ······ |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.