Well, Emily Sparks, your prayers were not wasted
Your love was not all in vain
I owe whatever I was in life
To your hope that would not give me up
To your love that saw me still as good
Dear Emily Sparks, let me tell you the story
I pa** the effect of my father and mother;
The milliner's daughter made me trouble
And out I went in the world
Where I pa**ed through every peril known
Of wine and women and joy of life
One night, in a room in the Rue de Rivoli
I was drinking wine with a black-eyed cocotte
And the tears swam into my eyes
She thought they were amorous tears and smiled
For thought of her conquest over me
But my soul was three thousand miles away
In the days when you taught me in Spoon River
And just because you no more could love me
Nor pray for me, nor write me letters
The eternal silence of you spoke instead
And the black-eyed cocotte took the tears for hers
As well as the deceiving kisses I gave her
Somehow, from that hour, I had a new vision—
Dear Emily Sparks!