Art and Politics / Politics and Art

Lincoln’s Summer House

11 Lincoln’s Summer House In Lincoln’s Summer House there was no peace, though miles from importuning citizens who streamed to the White House, certain of his aid. The Summer House, a wartime gift to the nation, stood watch beside the newly built Veterans’ Home where Lincoln sometimes dined with the servicemen and cheered them by his presence, spoke and ate whatever simple meals they all might share, with Rock Creek National Cemetery dug behind them. From his window the president watched the Union dead. Hour by hour they were carted in, averaged thirty-eight a day, were measured by coffins buried in strict rows, hour by hour. Young men silent, stiff, used up. One studies Lincoln’s face, the monumental grief carved into it, the field of sorrows fled to lenses of his eyes entrapped in hollow hues of blue and black and gray. ...