Poems About Vachel Lindsay, the Lindsay family
and Vachel Lindsay Home State Historic Site
Springfield, Illinois

Have you written a poem about Vachel, his family or the family's beautifully restored home? If you have, please e-mail it to writer@eosinc.com with your name and e-mail address so I can share it here. You keep all publication rights and can publish it anywhere else.

Vachel Was A Preacher
                

(introduction) Before Woody Guthrie roamed "This land (that) is your land."
               Before Bobby Dylan asked "How Many Times?"
               Beforee Peter, Paul and Mary met Puff the Magic Dragon
               Roamed a man who ruled the world with his rhythms and his rhymes.

He was born and grew to manhood in olde Springfield, Illinois.
His father was a doctor and his mom, the patient saint.
His heart became the tablet where he wrote (to save the world)
Of his homeland and heaven, and love without restraint.
Some say he was a goofball type who never quite fit in.
Some say he was a gurgling and frothy manic stew.
Some say he was a singer who could not carry the tune.
But Vachel was a preacher and I am too.

Vachel was a preacher.
Vachel was a preacher.
  Vachel was a preacher and I am too.

Through the grim, effacing tumult to fulfill his parents' hopes,
He caromed like an 8-ball off conventionality.
Off of days at Hiram College and of stocking Marshall Fields,
And of trying to be an artist deep in New York C. 
Yet throughout the times of trial, the consistent note that played
Was a beat that came so natural to pen and point of view.
It led to "vaudeville of poetry" and fame upon the stage.
But Vachel was a preacher and I am too.

Vachel was a preacher.
Vachel was a preacher.
  Vachel was a preacher and I am too.

So when you hear the rocking ramble of a measured fable, plain
In truth, and nourishing as manna sent from high,
Thank the man whose lasting poems come as easy to the ear
As the fishes came to Jesus for the multitudes nearby.
And consider how what was important then is still important now.
This despite the shouts of compromise from voices that are new.
And consider how we all should be good preachers for the cause.
You know Vachel was a preacher and you are too!

Vachel was a preacher.
Vachel was a preacher.
  Vachel was a preacher and you   are    too!

                                                      -- by Job Conger,  January 28, 1995

                                         
Vachel House Possum
                    
She is just a mother possum under Vachel's house.
You can tell because she's bigger than a rat or mouse.
And she doesn't want to bite you, even though she could.
She's just eking out her mother possum livelihood.

Gardener, Kathy, saw some baby possums stroll inside
The shed where they store shears and sometimes, pesticide.
It was hard to tell who was the more surprised, and so
Director Jennie said the possum family had to go.

First, they had to reunite the kids with mom; not hard.
They just set them in the middle of the big back yard
And walked away. When they looked again, the possum pups were gone.
All they saw were shrubs and blossoms and a lush, green lawn.

Then the challenge was to trap the family complete.
For the poet's house is more than a possum retreat.
Hey! Besides, they'll scare the tourists, and that isn't right.
Just imagine Vachel writing "Abe Possum Lurks at Midnight."

She was just a mother possum doing her own thing
'S not a sin for gross marsupials to go wandering.
She'll be just as happy elsewhere as at Vachel's place,
And the tourists will never miss her possum face.

The bard who wrote in youth of crickets on a strike,
Of heroes, presidents and fairies and the like
Never wrote a possum poem, near as I can say,
But one possum knew of Vachel. Now she's moved away.

                            -- by Job Conger, May 27, 2004



The Whispering Wind  

Before the famous poet's people
came to this place, arrived the young Elijah A.
Lindsay, "died November 14, 1881"
son of N. and Martha Lindsay
first to lie, warm-remembered, with the whispering winds
by the lane near the top of the hill.

Then came the poet's toddler sisters
Isabel, Esther and Eudora Lindsay
daughters of Doctor Thomas and Catharine,
barely aware of the delights of living,
not imagining the fame that would someday touch the family,
swept by the epidemic flu from their warm hearth
to repose through the long years with the whispering winds
by the lane near the top of the hill

                                            --- by Job Conger, March 21, 2007
                                                                                                     photos by Job Conger

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