Edgar Lee Masters (1868–1950). Spoon River Anthology. 1916.
120. John Cabanis
NNor forgetfulness of the shiftlessness,
And the lawlessness and waste
Under democracy’s rule in Spoon River
Made me desert the party of law and order
And lead the liberal party.
Fellow citizens! I saw as one with second sight
That every man of the millions of men
Who give themselves to Freedom,
And fail while Freedom fails,
Enduring waste and lawlessness,
And the rule of the weak and the blind,
Dies in the hope of building earth,
Like the coral insect, for the temple
To stand on at the last.
And I swear that Freedom will wage to the end
The war for making every soul
Wise and strong and as fit to rule
As Plato’s lofty guardians
In a world republic girdled!