Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Marietta Holley: The Song

Do you know the low feeling, about a third of the way through a big project (a novel, say -- or a wallpapering job, or a knitted sweater), when the pile of glittering good intentions with which you began your effort seems to be sifting down into nothing and your stamina is at a low ebb? I've been trying to unstick myself from such a moment. I've been reading Marietta Holley's own words, and getting up my enthusiasm to know more about the suffrage movement and what exactly Susan B. Anthony said and when. Today, in my noodling, I found "The Ballad of Marietta Holley", courtesy of the students at South Jefferson Central High, in Adams:

"Oh Marietta, I need to know you.
Oh Marietta, why don't I know you?
I would have thought they would have told me of you in school.
Oh Marietta, I need to find you."

Can you believe it? They read my mind. Click here to see the affecting video, complete with photographs from the Watertown Historical Society. You may not need your hankie, but I sure did.