Several years ago, Dan Guillory began a
series of poems about Abraham Lincoln’s life. The poems,
chronicling the events and people in the life of the 16th
president, are written from Lincoln’s perspective. To mark
Lincoln’s birthday, we’re publishing a selection
— the third year we’ve done so. — Editor
Ice Cream at the Smiths Mary Todd Lincoln’s younger sister Ann
Marie married Clark M. Smith, a successful Springfield businessman,
who owned the C.M. and S. Smith Store on the old Capitol Square.
The Smiths moved into the house at 603 S. Fifth St. that was later
purchased by Dr. Vachel Thomas Lindsay, the father of poet Vachel
Lindsay. Interestingly enough, the Smith house was built by the
same Rev. Charles Dresser who had sold the Lincolns their home at
Eighth and Jackson. On Sunday afternoons in the late 1850s, the
Lincolns would often walk a few blocks to visit their relatives and
socialize while making ice cream. The recipe for strawberry ice
cream used here is drawn from Miss Leslie’s Directions for Cookery (1843),
the most popular cookbook of its day (Mary Todd Lincoln owned one).
Sugar at this time was not refined as today’s white
granulated sugar is. It was sold in blocks or “loaves.”
Rock salt, snow, or natural ice was packed into the ice-cream churn
around a covered vessel called the freezer. Although the future
president did not exhibit much of an appetite for most dishes, Dr.
Wayne C. Temple, in The Taste Is in My
Mouth a Little (2004), argues that
Lincoln had a pronounced sweet tooth. These ice-cream socials may
have represented some of Lincoln’s last peaceful moments
before the tumultuous years of the presidency.
Clark, the good merchant, purveys firewood,
brown and white Eggs, oiled leather boots, slouch hats, rock
salt and loaves Of sugar. Mary offers a bowl of pulpy red
strawberries And Clark supplies two pounds of loaf-sugar
and half A gallon of cream so thick it whitewashes the
insides Of his bucket. I add rock salt and chunks of
pond-ice. We talk, filling the churn,
grinding-grinding, religion Weather and politics, grinding-grinding,
until the silence Is purified into ice and sweetness, the
cupped coldness Savored on the tongue, that too-sharp moment,
quickly Melting into impossibility, like the
surrounding heat Rising in vapors over the rain-darkened
garden. ______________
Pigs in Taylorville During the time he served on the Eighth
Judicial Circuit Court, under the watchful eye of his good friend
Judge David Davis (whom he later appointed to the Supreme Court),
Lincoln considered Taylorville his last stop on the circuit before
returning home to Springfield. Local tradition has it that, on one
occasion, the orderly business of the court was interrupted by a
noisy group of porkers under the floor. In a humorous moment,
lawyer Lincoln asked Judge Davis for a writ of quietus against the
vociferous hogs and proceeded to coax them away. On May 28, 2005,
sculptor John McClarey unveiled his bronze statue “The Last Stop” on the Christian
County Courthouse lawn, commemorating this event. It is worth
speculating whether Lincoln saw the symbolic and metaphorical
implications of the pigs, especially after he settled in Washington as
the 16th president.
Such whining, wheezing, snorting, and
grunting — A guttural affront to the dignity and
gravitas Of the court and all legislative proceedings.
My Learned brothers, whether Democrat,
Republican, Or Whig, I say to you, Learn well the lesson
Of big-bellied swine who inhabit the lowest
reaches Of the legal establishment, who wallow
tenderly in pools Of mud, supping on the very scum of the
earth, sticking Their snouts into every unspeakable place
— by dint Of their cacophonous wailings, they shatter
the concord And peacefulness that empower all rational
discourse. Then, utterly exhausted by their efforts,
they roll over On a bed of their own waste, snoring into
oblivion. ______________
Socks in Danville, September 21, 1858 In 1855, Dr. William Fithian built a house in
Danville, Ill., that later became his office. Like Lincoln, Fithian
was an Illinois legislator in Springfield, and he knew Lincoln
quite well. During the Civil War, Fithian served as a U.S. Army
surgeon. In the late summer of 1858, during the hectic season of
the Lincoln-Douglas debates, an overworked Lincoln visited Danville
and attempted to give a speech from Fithian’s front porch,
but he had earlier suffered from severely swollen feet and could
not pull his boots back on, causing him acute embarrassment and
momentary panic. Fithian saved the day by positioning Lincoln on
his second-floor balcony in such a way that his socks would not be
visible to the crowd below. Although we do not possess the text of
that speech, it is probable that Lincoln spoke about the great
issue of slavery and its various political and legal
manifestations, such as the Missouri Compromise, the
Kansas-Nebraska Act (1854), the controversial Dred Scott case
(1857), and “popular sovereignty” (or states’
rights) as promulgated by Stephen Douglas, Lincoln’s
archenemy. Danville was the last site in Illinois where Lincoln
spoke on his way to Washington, D.C., Feb. l1, 1861.
Feet and ankles swollen like a sycamore tree!
Hot blisters rising up like knots and buds. Enough talk of Compromise and Constitution! In this Inferno, no more boundary lines And demarcations, no more Free and Slave
States! For even a man with swollen ankles and no
boots On his feet knows Evil when he sees it And can stand up for what is right Even in his stocking feet, high on a balcony In Old Danville, Vermilion County, Illinois.
This article appears in Feb 9-15, 2006.
