Abraham Lincoln was the most poetic of American presidents — he wrote a few poems himself, his speeches are remembered today for their poetic power, and he was the object and inspiration of many, many poems. To commemorate the anniversary of Lincoln’s birth (now celebrated together with George Washington’s birthday as President’s Day), here is a sampling of the classic poems written about Lincoln:
- Walt Whitman,
“When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d” from Leaves of Grass (1900)
- Walt Whitman,
“O Captain! My Captain!” from Leaves of Grass (1900)
- James Russell Lowell,
“Abraham Lincoln, from the Ode Recited at the Harvard Commemoration” (1865)
- Julia Ward Howe,
“Poem on the 100th anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln” (1909)
- Vachel Lindsay,
“Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight” (1914)
- Carl Sandburg,
“Knucks” & “Cool Tombs” (from Cornhuskers, 1918)
- Hyam Plutzik,
“To Abraham Lincoln, That He Walk by Day” (written in the 1940s, ©1987)
