text: I went to the dances at Chandlerville,
  And played snap-out at Winchester.
  One time we changed partners,
  Driving home in the moonlight of middle June,
  And then I found Davis.
  We were married and lived together for seventy years,
  Enjoying, working, raising the twelve children,
  Eight of whom we lost
  Ere I had reached the age of sixty.
  I spun, I wove, I kept the house, I nursed the sick,
  I made the garden, and for holiday
  Rambled over the fields where sang the larks,
  And by Spoon River gathering many a shell,
  And many a flower and medicinal weed
  Shouting to the wooded hills, singing to the green valleys.
  At ninety-six I had lived enough, that is all,
  And passed to a sweet repose.
  What is this I hear of sorrow and weariness,
  Anger, discontent and drooping hopes?
  Degenerate sons and daughters,
  Life is too strong for you
  It takes life to love Life.