Take note, passers-by, of the sharp erosions
Eaten in my head-stone by the wind and rain —
Almost as if an intangible Nemesis or hatred
Were marking scores against me,
But to destroy, and not preserve, my memory.
I in life was the Circuit judge, a maker of notches,
Deciding cases on the points the lawyers scored,
Not on the right of the matter.
O wind and rain, leave my head-stone alone!
For worse than the anger of the wronged,
The curses of the poor,
Was to lie speechless, yet with vision clear,
Seeing that even Hod Putt, the murderer,
Hanged by my sentence,
Was innocent in soul compared with me.

Analysis, meaning and summary of Edgar Lee Masters's poem The Circuit Judge

1 Comment

  1. Michael Tustison says:

    I think since Edgar Lee Masters was a Lawyer. He saw
    A judges ruling and didn’t like it. So he found a story on a judge that died. He then wrote
    a poem on how a judge has no side until the verdict
    is deleivered. Good Poem Though Mike 18, Washington St.

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