The Poets' Lincoln Part 14

[Ill.u.s.tration: PRESIDENT LINCOLN

Photograph by Brady]

Margaret Elizabeth Sangster, born at New Roch.e.l.le, New York, February 22, 1838. Educated privately, chiefly in New York. Became contributor to leading periodicals; also editor of _Hearth and Home_, 1871-73; _Christian at Work_, 1873-79; _The Christian Intelligencer_ since 1879; postmistress _Harper's Young People_, 1882-89; editor _Harper's Bazar_, 1889-99; staff contributor _Christian Herald_ since 1894; _Ladies' Home Journal_, 1899-1905; _Woman's Home Companion_ since 1905. Author _Poems of the Household_; _Home Fairies and Heart Flowers_; _On the Road Home_; _Easter Bells_; _Winsome Womanhood_; _Little Knights and Ladies_; _Lyrics of Love_; _When Angels Come to Men_; _Good Manners for All Occasions_; _The Story Bible_; _Fairest Girlhood_; _From My Youth Up_; _Happy School Days_. She died June 4, 1912.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

(_February 12, 1809-1909_)

Child of the boundless prairie, son of the virgin soil, Heir to the bearing of burdens, brother to them that toil; G.o.d and Nature together shaped him to lead in the van, In the stress of her wildest weather when the Nation needed a Man.

Eyes of a smoldering fire, heart of a lion at bay, Patience to plan for tomorrow, valor to serve for today, Mournful and mirthful and tender, quick as a flash with a jest, Hiding with gibe and great laughter the ache that was dull in his breast.

Met were the Man and the Hour--Man who was strong for the shock-- Fierce were the lightnings unleashed; in the midst, he stood fast as a rock.

Comrade he was and commander, he who was meant for the time, Iron in council and action, simple, aloof, and sublime.

Swift slip the years from their tether, centuries pa.s.s like a breath, Only some lives are immortal, challenging darkness and death.

Hewn from the stuff of the martyrs, write on the stardust his name, Glowing, untarnished, transcendent, high on the records of Fame.

Oh, man of many sorrows, 'twas your blood That flowed at Chickamauga, at Bull Run, Vicksburg, Antietam, and the gory wood And Wilderness of ravenous Deaths that stood Round Richmond like a ghostly garrison: Your blood for those who won, For those who lost, your tears!

For you the strife, the fears, For us, the sun!

For you the lashing winds and the beating rain in your eyes, For us the ascending stars and the wide, unbounded skies.

Oh, man of storms! Patient and kingly soul!

Oh, wise physician of a wasted land!

A nation felt upon its heart your hand, And lo, your hand hath made the shattered, whole, With iron clasp your hand hath held the wheel Of the lurching ship, on tempest waves no keel Hath ever sailed.

A grim smile held your lips when strong men quailed.

You strove alone with chaos and prevailed; You felt the grinding shock and did not reel, And, ah, your hand that cut the battle's path Wide with the devastating plague of wrath, Your bleeding hand, gentle with pity yet, Did not forget To bless, to succor, and to heal.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PRESIDENT LINCOLN

Photograph by Alexander Gardner, Washington, D. C., 1864]

Wilbur d.i.c.k Nesbit was born at Xenia, Ohio, September 16, 1871.

Educated in the public schools at Cedarville, Ohio. Was printer and reporter on various Ohio and Indiana papers until 1898; verse writer and paragrapher _Baltimore American_, 1899-1902; since that year writer of verse and humor _Chicago Evening Post_ and other newspapers, contributor of stories and poems to magazines and periodicals. Author of _Little Henry's Slate_, 1903; _The Trail to Boyland and Other Poems_, 1904; _An Alphabet of History_, 1905; _The Gentleman Ragman_, 1906; _A Book of Poems_, 1906; _The Land of Make-Believe and Other Christmas Poems_, 1907; _A Friend or Two_, 1908; _The Loving Cup_ (compilation), 1909; _The Old, Old Wish_, 1911; _My Company of Friends_, 1911; _If the Heart be Glad_, 1911; co-author with Otto Hauerbach of _The Girl of My Dreams_, a musical comedy, 1910.

THE MAN LINCOLN

Not as the great who grow more great Until from us they are apart-- He walks with us in man's estate; We know his was a brother heart.

The marching years may render dim The humanness of other men; Today we are akin to him As they who knew him best were then.

Wars have been won by mail-clad hands, Realms have been ruled by sword-hedged kings, But he above these others stands As one who loved the common things; The common faith of man was his, The common faith of man he had-- For this today his grave face is A face half joyous and half sad.

A man of earth! Of earthy stuff, As honest as the fruitful soil, Gnarled as the friendly trees, and rough As hillsides that had known his toil; Of earthy stuff--let it be told, For earth-born men rise and reveal A courage fair as beaten gold And the enduring strength of steel.

So now he dominates our thought.

This humble great man holds us thus Because of all he dreamed and wrought; Because he is akin to us.

He held his patient trust in truth While G.o.d was working out His plan, And they that were his foes, forsooth, Came to pay tribute to the Man.

Not as the great who grow more great Until they have a mystic fame-- No stroke of fortune nor of fate Gave Lincoln his undying name.

A common man, earth-bred, earth-born, One of the breed who work and wait-- His was a soul above all scorn.

His was a heart above all hate.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PRESIDENT LINCOLN AT ANTIETAM

Photograph taken on the battlefield, September, 1862, with General McClellan and Allen Pinkerton]

Edwin Arlington Robinson, born at Head Tide, Maine, December 22, 1869.

Educated at Gardiner, Maine, and Harvard University, 1891-3. Member National Inst.i.tute Arts and Letters. Author: _The Torrent_ and _The Night Before_, 1896; _The Children of the Night_, 1897, 1905; _Captain Craig_ (poems), _The Town Down the River_, 1910.

THE MASTER

(LINCOLN)

A flying word from here and there Had sown the name at which we sneered, But soon the name was everywhere, To be reviled and then revered: A presence to be loved and feared, We cannot hide it, or deny That we, the gentlemen who jeered, May be forgotten by and by.

He came when days were perilous And hearts of men were sore beguiled; And having made his note of us, He pondered and was reconciled.

Was ever master yet so mild As he, and so untamable?

We doubted, even when he smiled, Not knowing what he knew so well.

He knew that undeceiving fate Would shame us whom he served unsought; He knew that he must wince and wait-- The jest of those for whom he fought; He knew devoutly what he thought Of us and of our ridicule; He knew that we must all be taught Like little children in a school.

We gave a glamour to the task That he encountered and saw through, But little of us did he ask, And little did we ever do.

And what appears if we review The season when we railed and chaffed?

It is the face of one who knew That we were learning while we laughed.

The face that in our vision feels Again the venom that we flung, Transfigured to the world reveals The vigilance to which we clung.

Shrewd, hallowed, hara.s.sed, and among The mysteries that are untold, The face we see was never young Nor could it ever have been old.

For he, to whom we had applied Our shopman's test of age and worth, Was elemental when he died, As he was ancient at his birth: The saddest among kings of earth, Bowed with a galling crown, this man Met rancor with a cryptic mirth, Laconic--and Olympian.