In Lincoln's Footsteps. Poem by Michael Walker

James Garfield was born in a log cabin
in the small-town Midwest, like Lincoln.
He was a teacher at the Eclectic Institute,
was called to the bar then the Ohio Senate.

Garfield was a Republican before the Civil War
when he became a brigadier in the Union Army;
he commanded troops on the forest hills of Shiloh
where the Union defeated the Confederate South.

In Reconstruction Garfield rebuilt most things,
free education and civil rights for all Americans.
He named ex-slaves to high places in administration.
He moved from high tariffs to free trade.

James Garfield's tragic six-month presidency
raised the question of what might have been.

-8-11 May,2017.