Jay Hawkins
Jay walking! Reading the headlines! Struck down
By a fliver and killed while reading
About the man-girl slayer!
For years haunting the newstands,
Waiting for the latest papers from Chicago,
Cursed with the newspaper habit:
Snuffing the powder of monstrous news
Heralding shame and hate and murder:
What dive was raided, what rum was seized;
Who was indicted, and who was lynched;
Who got the rope at the end of the trial;
What governor, officer was accused
Of bribery, graft, or perculation.
Whose picture appeared divorced or caught--
(Were they never noble, did they never achieve,
And so have their pictures printed?)
All about hating, hunting, fighting,
Lying, stealing, lusting, wasting,
Who has been killed, and who has been hanged.
And I ask if life is full of beauty,
And full of nobility and creating,
Why don't they write about it?
--Edgar Lee Masters
The Spoon River Anthology 1924
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