Spoon River Anthology is an anthologized collection of free-verse poems presented as the epitaphs of the inhabitants of the fictional town of Spoon River. The poems are intimately involved in deconstructing the mystique of small-town life and in presenting Spoon River's residents as foibled and principled human beings with rich internal lives. The poems themselves are written as streams of consciousness full of random observations about life and about the town's inhabitants.