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Tag: poetry
Inaugural poet Amanda Gorman

#EndorseThis: Amanda Gorman's 'The Hill We Climb' Will Leave You Spellbound

Poetry rewards repeated attention -- especially when it is spoken aloud, like The Hill We Climb, the extraordinary six minutes of verse recited yesterday by Amanda Gorman that entranced millions of Americans at yesterday's presidential inauguration.

The youngest person ever to deliver a poem at a U.S. presidential inauguration, Gorman's beautiful language and dramatic delivery left her millions of listeners in awe. Dressed in a vibrant yellow coat, braids in a bun with a bold red hat, the 22 year-old writer perfectly evoked the themes enunciated by President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris on that historic day.

She brought something very special to this symbolic moment when hate and division lost, while democracy prevailed --- even though it was pushed to the very edge. Watch for the first time or watch again -- you won't be disappointed.

National Youth Poet Laureate Amanda Gorman at Presidential Inaugurationwww.youtube.com


The Hill We Climb

When day comes we ask ourselves,
where can we find light in this never-ending shade?
The loss we carry,
a sea we must wade
We've braved the belly of the beast
We've learned that quiet isn't always peace
And the norms and notions
of what just is
Isn't always just-ice
And yet the dawn is ours
before we knew it
Somehow we do it
Somehow we've weathered and witnessed
a nation that isn't broken
but simply unfinished
We the successors of a country and a time
Where a skinny Black girl
descended from slaves and raised by a single mother
can dream of becoming president
only to find herself reciting for one
And yes we are far from polished
far from pristine
but that doesn't mean we are
striving to form a union that is perfect
We are striving to forge a union with purpose
To compose a country committed to all cultures, colors, characters and
conditions of man
And so we lift our gazes not to what stands between us
but what stands before us
We close the divide because we know, to put our future first,
we must first put our differences aside
We lay down our arms
so we can reach out our arms
to one another
We seek harm to none and harmony for all
Let the globe, if nothing else, say this is true:
That even as we grieved, we grew
That even as we hurt, we hoped
That even as we tired, we tried
That we'll forever be tied together, victorious
Not because we will never again know defeat
but because we will never again sow division
Scripture tells us to envision
that everyone shall sit under their own vine and fig tree
And no one shall make them afraid
If we're to live up to our own time
Then victory won't lie in the blade
But in all the bridges we've made
That is the promised glade
The hill we climb
If only we dare
It's because being American is more than a pride we inherit,
it's the past we step into
and how we repair it
We've seen a force that would shatter our nation
rather than share it
Would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy
And this effort very nearly succeeded
But while democracy can be periodically delayed
it can never be permanently defeated
In this truth
in this faith we trust
For while we have our eyes on the future
history has its eyes on us
This is the era of just redemption
We feared at its inception
We did not feel prepared to be the heirs
of such a terrifying hour
but within it we found the power
to author a new chapter
To offer hope and laughter to ourselves
So while once we asked,
how could we possibly prevail over catastrophe?
Now we assert
How could catastrophe possibly prevail over us?
We will not march back to what was
but move to what shall be
A country that is bruised but whole,
benevolent but bold,
fierce and free
We will not be turned around
or interrupted by intimidation
because we know our inaction and inertia
will be the inheritance of the next generation
Our blunders become their burdens
But one thing is certain:
If we merge mercy with might,
and might with right,
then love becomes our legacy
and change our children's birthright
So let us leave behind a country
better than the one we were left with
Every breath from my bronze-pounded chest,
we will raise this wounded world into a wondrous one
We will rise from the gold-limbed hills of the west,
we will rise from the windswept northeast
where our forefathers first realized revolution
We will rise from the lake-rimmed cities of the midwestern states,
we will rise from the sunbaked south
We will rebuild, reconcile and recover
and every known nook of our nation and
every corner called our country,
our people diverse and beautiful will emerge,
battered and beautiful
When day comes we step out of the shade,
aflame and unafraid
The new dawn blooms as we free it
For there is always light,
if only we're brave enough to see it
If only we're brave enough to be it

Woman’s Face On U.S. Currency Shouldn’t Be A Politician’s Face

Woman’s Face On U.S. Currency Shouldn’t Be A Politician’s Face

Whoever the woman is on the next $10 bill, here’s who it shouldn’t be:

A politician. A Cabinet member. A First Lady.

Put a poet there. A scientist. A musician with a social cause. A social worker. A teacher. A suffragette. An abolitionist.

But, please, not someone primarily associated with politics.

Since Wednesday, when the U.S. Treasury Department announced that a woman will finally star on our paper money, opinions have heated up over who that woman should be.

The excitement is fun to watch, even if this is hardly an advance on par with the first moon landing.

In fact, it’s a bit of a letdown to some people. The honoree will be on a $10 bill instead of on a $20, a disappointment to those who wanted to oust Andrew Jackson.

The lucky winner won’t have the whole bill to herself either. She’ll have to cohabit with its current occupant, Alexander Hamilton.

And the redesign won’t arrive until 2020.

Still, it’s a breakthrough. As others have cracked, a woman is about to shatter the cash ceiling, at least for the first time since Martha Washington, wife of George, appeared on a silver certificate in the late 1800s.

But which woman?

A few women in the political realm are strong contenders.

One is Frances Perkins.

Perkins was U.S. Secretary of Labor under President Franklin D. Roosevelt. She fought for child-abor laws. She established the country’s first minimum-wage and overtime laws. I’ve heard her referred to as kickass, and she was.

If she became the face on the next $10 bill, I’d be proud to carry that cash.

But the new currency is the perfect opportunity to think beyond Washington, D.C., to consider the fact that people with power and courage exist beyond the narrow political realm.

That’s why First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, grand as she was, wouldn’t get my vote.

When I was thinking about this topic, someone asked me why we put people’s faces on our money at all.

Why not put an excerpt of the Constitution instead?

Why not birds or butterflies, the way the Costa Ricans do?

Why not pizza?

The best answer, I think, is that people contain stories. Through individual stories we get to tell our bigger, collective ones.

As Jacob Lew, the Treasury Secretary, put it, “America’s currency is a way for our nation to make a statement about who we are and what we stand for.”

Who we are extends into art and culture, the environment and education, social work, and while all of those overlap with politics, they’re different too.

Other countries have acknowledged that fact on their money for a long time.

The women on the Swedish krona include an opera singer and a Nobel Prize-winning writer. Turkey, Mexico, New Zealand and Australia all have women on their paper money. England plans to put the 19th-century writer Jane Austen on its 10-pound note.

Regardless of which woman winds up on our money, the discussion about it is useful.

Thinking and talking about it is a way to review history and learn it.

I was entertained by the names that popped into my mind when I pondered candidates.

What about Louisa May Alcott?

She was a feminist, abolitionist and the author of Little Women, a book that has inspired generations of plucky girls. I wouldn’t mind carrying her around in my wallet.

How about Jane Addams?

That woman did everything. She was a writer and philosopher. She campaigned for women’s right to vote. As the co-founder of Hull House in Chicago, she helped immigrants and the poor. She won the 1931 Nobel Peace Prize.

Handing Jane Addams to a cashier would make me stand up taller.

Rosa Parks, who bravely rode that segregated bus in Alabama? She’s high on my list too.

But when the argument is over, I hope the winner is the apparent frontrunner, Harriet Tubman.

I hadn’t thought of Tubman in years, frankly, but reminded of her life — an abolitionist born to slaves — I can’t imagine anyone better to represent who we’ve been and who we hope to be.

Whoever it is, it’s good to be reminded that the cash we carry represents the stories we tell ourselves.

(Mary Schmich is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the Chicago Tribune. Contact her at mschmich@tribune.com. You can follow her on twitter.com/maryschmich or contact her on facebook.com/maryschmich)

Photo: Elii Christman via Flickr

U.S. Poet Maya Angelou Dies At 86

U.S. Poet Maya Angelou Dies At 86

Washington (AFP) – Celebrated African-American author, poet and human rights activist Maya Angelou has died at the age of 86, U.S. media said Wednesday.

Mayor Allen Joines of Winston-Salem, North Carolina told Fox T.V. affiliate WGHP in the southern state that Angelou was found Wednesday morning by her caretaker.

“Listen to yourself and in that quietude you might hear the voice of God,” she wrote in the most recent post on her @DrMayaAngelou Twitter account on May 23.

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AFP Photo/Tim Sloan