MARION FORSTER GILMORE
Reading edition
Miss Marion Forster Gilmore, the young Louisville poet and dramatist, was born at Anchorage, Kentucky, November 27, 1887. She was educated at Hampton College, Louisville, and at a private school in Washington, D. C. At the age of fourteen years she wrote a poem while crossing the Rocky Mountains that attracted the attention of Joaquin Miller and Madison Cawein, and won her the friendship of both poets. When but fifteen years old she had completed her three-act tragedy of Virginia, set in Rome during the days of the Decemvirs. This is purely a play for the study, and hardly fitted for stage presentation, yet it has been praised by William Faversham, the famous actor. Miss Gilmore contributed lyrics to the Cosmopolitan Magazine and Leslie's Weekly, which, with her play, she published in a charming book, entitled Virginia, a Tragedy, and Other Poems (Louisville, Kentucky, 1910). The Cradle Song, originally printed in the Cosmopolitan for May, 1908, is one of the best of her shorter poems. Miss Gilmore has recently returned to her home at Louisville, after having spent a year in European travel and study.[98]
Bibliography. Cosmopolitan Magazine (January, 1909); Current Literature (August, 1910).
THE CRADLE SONG[99]
[From Virginia, a Tragedy, and Other Poems (Louisville, Kentucky, 1910)]
Adown the vista of the years, I turn and look with silent soul, As though to catch a muted strain Of melody, that seems to roll In tender cadence to my ear. But, as I wait with eyes that long The singer to behold—it fades, And silence ends the Cradle Song. But when the shadows of the years Have lengthened slowly to the West, And once again I lay me down To sleep, upon my mother's breast, Then well I know I ne'er again Shall cry to God, "How long? How long?" For, to my soul, her voice will sing A never-ending Cradle Song.