When Reuben Pantier ran away and threw me <br />I went to Springfield. There I met a lush, <br />Whose father just deceased left him a fortune. <br />He married me when drunk. My life was wretched. <br />A year passed and one day they found him dead. <br />That made me rich. I moved on to Chicago. <br />After a time met Tyler Rountree, villain. <br />I moved on to New York. A gray-haired magnate <br />Went mad about me -- so another fortune. <br />He died one night right in my arms, you know. <br />(I saw his purple face for years thereafter.) <br />There was almost a scandal. I moved on, <br />This time to Paris. I was now a woman, <br />Insidious, subtle, versed in the world and rich. <br />My sweet apartment near the Champs Élysées <br />Became a center for all sorts of people, <br />Musicians, poets, dandies, artists, nobles, <br />Where we spoke French and German, Italian, English. <br />I wed Count Navigato, native of Genoa. <br />We went to Rome. He poisoned me, I think. <br />Now in the Campo Santo overlooking <br />The sea where young Columbus dreamed new worlds, <br />See what they chiseled: "Contessa Navigato <br />Implora eterna quiete."<br /><br />Edgar Lee Masters<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/dora-williams/
