February 20, 2016
Dear Subscriber:
Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week, in honor of President’s Day, Lincoln’s Birthday, and Washington’s Birthday, is political activism and greatness.
Today’s poem is a Presidents Day poem about how Washington and then Lincoln kept the Union together.
I welcome comments on my poems at http://nicholasgordon.blogspot.com.
Yours,
Nick Gordon
The President was without precedent
At the time that he took on the post.
Equally homespun and elegant,
He struck the precisely right note.
Refusing the power of kings,
He yet understood that the State
Required what reverence brings:
A loyalty one can create.
And so he became The Great Leader,
The focus of wide adulation.
Yet only a one-time repeater,
He served not the man, but the nation.
He gave to the State what the states
Could only recopy writ small:
The sense of a Center the fates
Must bless for the good of us all.
He played well the hero who held
The Union together those years,
Until the still-thin mixture jelled,
And fact was more forceful than fears;
Till the other great president we
Now jam into one day for two
Kept the Union together and free,
His own blood the ultimate glue.
© by Nicholas Gordon
Hear or watch me recite the poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/thepre.html. For more Presidents Day poems, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/presidentsdaypoems.html.
This week’s theme: Political Activism and Greatness.
Feb. 15: Greatness Is the Child of Choice and Chance
Feb. 16: Seventy-Six2
Feb. 17: Great Ends Demand Great Sacrifice
Feb. 18: Some Would Have the Courage of Their Dreams
Feb. 19: Greatness Is Effect Far More than Cause
Feb. 20: The President Was Without Precedent
Dear Subscriber:
Each week we examine a theme from a variety of points of view. The theme for this week, in honor of President’s Day, Lincoln’s Birthday, and Washington’s Birthday, is political activism and greatness.
Today’s poem is a Presidents Day poem about how Washington and then Lincoln kept the Union together.
I welcome comments on my poems at http://nicholasgordon.blogspot.com.
Yours,
Nick Gordon
The President was without precedent
At the time that he took on the post.
Equally homespun and elegant,
He struck the precisely right note.
Refusing the power of kings,
He yet understood that the State
Required what reverence brings:
A loyalty one can create.
And so he became The Great Leader,
The focus of wide adulation.
Yet only a one-time repeater,
He served not the man, but the nation.
He gave to the State what the states
Could only recopy writ small:
The sense of a Center the fates
Must bless for the good of us all.
He played well the hero who held
The Union together those years,
Until the still-thin mixture jelled,
And fact was more forceful than fears;
Till the other great president we
Now jam into one day for two
Kept the Union together and free,
His own blood the ultimate glue.
© by Nicholas Gordon
Hear or watch me recite the poem and listen to the music I chose for it at http://www.poemsforfree.com/thepre.html. For more Presidents Day poems, go to http://www.poemsforfree.com/presidentsdaypoems.html.
This week’s theme: Political Activism and Greatness.
Feb. 15: Greatness Is the Child of Choice and Chance
Feb. 16: Seventy-Six2
Feb. 17: Great Ends Demand Great Sacrifice
Feb. 18: Some Would Have the Courage of Their Dreams
Feb. 19: Greatness Is Effect Far More than Cause
Feb. 20: The President Was Without Precedent
