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Elizabeth Alexander: The Inaugural Poem at Obama’s Swearing In

Posted by DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, Deputy Managing Editor, Columnist in At TMV.
Jan 22nd, 2009 | Comments

Elizabeth Alexander read her poem at Barack Obama’s inaugural. I’ve tracked down a written version and put it at the end of this article for you… so you can see her line breaks…

Remember, for those who are poetry-phobic from creepy experiences with non-understandable poetry forced onto them in highschool… though you can measure most poetic metre with an electronic slide rule, the heart of most poetry is far more simple…

Poetry is most often a glimpsing through a window into someone’s thoughts about something… peering through a portal to see a scene from life go by… described by someone who sometimes sees differently than we do, but sometimes just sees as we do and has a way of saying it all that calms, heals, thrills, elucidates, calls up a mystery of life, in some sense… satisfies a personal something in the psyche.

So, often, how one reads a poem on the page (to oneself). and the way an author might read the same poem aloud, may be two completely different experiences.

It appears this duality was so yesterday, and leaks into today too, with thousands of online comments criticising Miss Alexander’s way of reading her poem at the inaugural.

Many are saying she might as well have been saying a speech in prose. There’s much criticism of the poem itself for various reasons. There are also those who loved the poem and the performance, or one or the other.

With the arts I think, just my two cents’ worth, there can be no definitive final opinion about worth or not worth. Perhaps we can only be definitive about personal pleasure, or not pleasure. Understanding, or not understanding. Interest or not interest. Remembering something important, or not. Sensation, or not sensation. Useful, or not useful. Causing memory, or not. Learning, or not. On and on.

Oh sure, people can insist they alone know the real truth of utter perfection of whatever artful effort, but I once belonged to a flamenco/cantaora forum in which people would argue over the first note of a soleá which, according to some, must follow a rule that is written in flaming lead by God Itself so that the opening must be played in the “key of A Phrygian, or else. Ay!

The forum commenters tore into the flamenco music, the singers, the dancers, the guitarists, the dressmakers, the everything… atomizing every little finger move, knocking down every tremolo, and claiming ugliness in this one and peerless beauty in that one …. until a lot like the tigers in the old pc/non pc tale ‘black sambo’ they ran round and round the tree til their conversations all turned to predictable mush.

And in the meantime, there was little passion given to the fabulous spectacle of the dance; it’d all been poured into vitriol and righteous assertion, instead.

I dont think beauty is in the eye of the beholder. From listening to people’s dreams and psyches all these years, I think it is more complex than that.

I think it’s fine for us all to say what we like or dont, what we prefer… but there’s far more meaning to which art pieces a person is drawn to… this having a psychological basis, perhaps even biological, certainly often spiritual… there’s far more to what one is drawn to… than mere sense about whether a poem or a painting is good or not.

What we are drawn to, what we innately embrace or learn to love, can also signal us strongly about which pack we belong to… via what the pack loves and what leaves the pack puzzled or unmoved.

So, I believe for the most part that trying to masticate poets, painters, dancers, etc., with all the brimstone and invective one can muster … ought really be reserved for the true demons of this world.

It takes little courage to attack a poet. It takes cojones o ovarios to attack true evil. I’d rather save my vials of croc bile and squid ink to attempt to beard the real demons.

As a poet, I can barely imagine how difficult it would be to write a ceremonial poem on demand (er, by invitation), and to stand before a zillion ka-jillion people in the icy cold (which definitely affects the voice negatively), following Barack, an often gifted orator, (sort of like being the band after The Rolling Stones performs) and somehow manage not to look like Reepacheep– the mouse in C. S. Lewis’ Narnia Chronicles– doggedly and passionately waving a sword of courage that is actually only the size of a toothpick.

That Miss Alexander even got up on the dais without either going into sudden glassy-eyed trance, or falling down from nervous-knees… is certainly a ‘thank God for small mercies’ moment.

Here is Miss Alexander’s poem. It is called Praise Song For The Day.

PRAISE SONG FOR THE DAY: A POEM FOR BARACK OBAMA’S PRESIDENTIAL INAUGURATION

Each day we go about our business,
walking past each other, catching each other’s
eyes or not, about to speak or speaking.

All about us is noise. All about us is
noise and bramble, thorn and din, each
one of our ancestors on our tongues.

Someone is stitching up a hem, darning
a hole in a uniform, patching a tire,
repairing the things in need of repair.

Someone is trying to make music somewhere,
with a pair of wooden spoons on an oil drum,
with cello, boom box, harmonica, voice.

A woman and her son wait for the bus.
A farmer considers the changing sky.
A teacher says, Take out your pencils. Begin.

We encounter each other in words, words
spiny or smooth, whispered or declaimed,
words to consider, reconsider.

We cross dirt roads and highways that mark
the will of some one and then others, who said
I need to see what’s on the other side.

I know there’s something better down the road.
We need to find a place where we are safe.
We walk into that which we cannot yet see.

Say it plain: that many have died for this day.
Sing the names of the dead who brought us here,
who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges,

picked the cotton and the lettuce, built
brick by brick the glittering edifices
they would then keep clean and work inside of.

Praise song for struggle, praise song for the day.
Praise song for every hand-lettered sign,
the figuring-it-out at kitchen tables.

Some live by love thy neighbor as thyself,
others by first do no harm or take no more
than you need. What if the mightiest word is love?

Love beyond marital, filial, national,
love that casts a widening pool of light,
love with no need to pre-empt grievance.

In today’s sharp sparkle, this winter air,
any thing can be made, any sentence begun.
On the brink, on the brim, on the cusp,

praise song for walking forward in that light.

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spirasol

No, it won't likely end up on my best poem list, but I do like it, and the more I read it, I like it more, for its vague imagining of both the past and the future; little hints of people deciding to make a left or a right, to cross or wander into the wild, to break out in arrhythmic effort before settling into song proper.

And what will be the song of the day? she asks us, "what is the new song?". We don't know, but we are at this moment in time, at the edge, just before the throat and the mind collaborate spontaneously to strike a note.............and then another............until there is no turning back..............and there it is, the song, naked, brazen, full throttled, belted out............why any minute it will make itself known to your ear canals..............and you might get the urge to sing along. and yes we want to praise the miracle that there should be song at all, making its way toward our throats.

river

Dr. E.. . .now that i can see how the lines break. . .i had found one on the web written more like prose and could not find the gait. . . this makes a big difference. . . now i realize this is a low volume poem, near a whisper with the breath of soul underneath, reflective. . .slowly simmering rather than soaring with boiling ink. . . .read more as prayer than a praise. . . Thanks, for helping to find honor and balance. . .

ratbert3

it is not a bad poem, especially seeing it laid out, but frankly, a whisper is not what that day demanded: i needed something more like aretha franklin's impassioned song to the heavens! and all those people on the mall, bursting with joy, needed something more as well. not a good choice, unfortunately, especially with all the great poets this country has -- obama had to pick a buddy? come on.

my other beef with the poem, besides tone, is its softness, its simmeringness of theme: too vague and wishy washy. ancestors did not just "die," people are not darning socks or whatever, or waiting forever for a bus just because, but because that is what the power structure has dictated: that some be slaves, that mass transit gets no funding, etc etc. images disembodied from the harsh political contexts of reality are just that -- floating pictures that do not grab or punch, shock or move.

archangel

dear ratbert3, your comment is the gut of mythopoetics... knowing the diff between the light touch and the real (forgive me for being crude) sh__. The nasty sometimes, instead of the nicely glossesd. There are many styles of poetry taught in school(s). Some of them make me want to tear my hair out when what's created sounds like clavichord music, only the same page, over and over, but played by different people. Energy is what youre saying, more energy. Agreed.

dear river, thats a great phrase, low volume poem; I think you sensed too... for the way many are configured psychologically, gutwise, it couldve used a little or a lot more hard sh__. In shrinkdom, we call certain personalities, low energy vitality... whether with regard to their sexuality, ambitions, or their oomph (technical term). For them, they ARE unleashing everything, when to those of a different capacity, it seems they are only producing a light and mannered touch.

dear spirasol, new song... you'd be one of the first ones to hear it and bless it, I know your heart would.

dr.e

kolimpah

Wow, this article is just as dull and pseudo open-minded as anyone could hope for. Hmm, sort of like that poem.

archangel

Dear kolimpah, didnt we meet in Austin Tx a while back? I think you're a young painter, right?

dr.e

kolimpah

Geez, isn't the internet supposed to be all big and anonymous? It's just my luck that the one time I decide to be snide and the moderator knows me.

So, Dr. E how did we meet?

archangel

Dear kolimpah, I'm glad you responded; that took cojones. Good. Re your question: I'm not sure, but when I'm on book tour, I often try to stop by small exhibits, art stores, coffee shops, schools, and the occasional 'rabble' hang outs to meet with and hopefully encourage young poets and artists. Now I may not be recalling accurately, but one of my interests for decades has been 'the outsider' as in outsider art, (but also as in the disenfranchised, and those who hold visions that general population hasnt even yet dreamed)... and I think somewhere on that grid our paths crossed. If you are who I recall, you are a young painter I think. The name kolimpah is not the usual, as you know. ;; } (the emoticon is because I wear glasses to read...yes black bird wing glasses with red rhinestones... really. lol)

And, kolimpah, you are welcome here to join the discussions any time. There are commentary rules that you will see below the comment box, essentially making TMV a place for years now, where people can discuss and debate, but not attack other commenters or the journalists. There are, as you know, lots of sites that sort of specialize in 'snidery,' but this is not one. Like I said, you are welcome here and if you like discussing politics, or at least seeing a pretty broad spectrum of opinions about culture and politics, you might find a lot of that here.

We have 20+ journalists who coblog for The Moderate Voice. Many of us are artists in our own right in one way or another, performance, broadcast, book authoring, audiorecording,etc. Joe Gandelman, our Editor in Chief, is a former journalist at San Diego Trib and other large papers, and he also has a day job (we all have day jobs, as you know the pay is good if you can consider air, pay) as an accomplished ventriloquist. Serious.

Be well kolimpah, paint alot.

dr.e

archangel

Oh, and also kolimpah, I like to encourage our commenters, when they can, or find it germane, to tell the stories about their own twists and turns of life in their comments. It is, to me, one of the richest parts of the commentary at TMV, often deeply moving briefest narratives of the ways of life and backgrounds that are rarely seen/heard about in mainstream media. Also, our commenters are from all over the world, which lays down, often, on any given day a lively mosaic here.

dr.e

archangel

dear ratbert, I kept thinking about what you said in your comment about the energy of the crowd... AND the potential of the crowd to be brought to their feet ... and the mannerliness of the poem in contrast. I think you ought write more about that in general. It's quite a clang. Perhaps too such a missed oppty when, what? perhaps one's nervousness makes one too tidy when in fact the crowd is ready, in this case, to go wild for long moments. In our old Latino healing practices of curanderismo, the healer/ saman (oldest spelling of the word shaman) would definitely grok the crowds desire to ride the drum up into the sky. And would see to it.

dr.e

archangel

and dear river... I've been thinking overnight (you know me, way long after midnight blogger...lol) about your parsing between the word prayer and the word praise. I think Miss Alexander had her own idea of a praise poem that is different than how I have understood praise poem from various ethnic backgrounds re poet making... as one that literally names people, the events, the tragedies, the triumphs, the dead zones, the radiance, the dashed dreams, the ugly, the hopeful aspects of that life or that population. I have been thinking about your saying it seemed more prayer like. I think youre right. As prayer structure... which I think can be ANYTHING, it may read stronger that way. Prayer. And for many then, the question would be, as it was with all the plethora of preachers at the inaugural, each seeming to me to represent a generation of thought, some very anachronistic, ... did this particular prayer speak to a segment of the people? I imagine it did, the same way some hymns speak to some, the way some dont grok the hymns but can listen to Gregoriana all day and all night.

Just my two cent's worth. To tell you the truth, I am still knocked out that 'the big guys' recognize a place for poets in ceremonials at all!

dr.e

kolimpah

I've never exhibited or sold my work but I am a young man in Austin who paints. However, my work has neither the distinctiveness nor the originality to be considered outsider work.

At any rate, by way of explaining my snideness, I feel that there are at least two areas in which moderation is inappropriate: Politics and Art. I also believe that intense criticism plays a valuable role in both, and labeling art criticism as evil is just as much name calling and grenade throwing as calling a poem dull and meritless but not half as interesting.

archangel

dear kolimpah, thanks for your thoughts. I'm not sure youre referring to this article, for there's no 'labeling art crit as evil'... I think that for me, more broadly, and this is just my two cents' worth... after hearing 7 decades of many argue various aspects of 'art,' and knowing various crit-lit authors and profs, I feel pretty certain I am not needed there.

There are some few who bring lit crit for instance, to an elegant art form, I think. Just as we each have our 'lights' we think useful or interesting in the art of political critique. I like particually how commenters here offered their own understandings, for instance, of how the inuagural poem struck them... with specifics that are far more than like it/dont like it. As you will see, or may have already, if you peruse sites across internet with regard to this inaugural poem, many persons' comments are screed rather than trying to sort out something that is more than just how it strikes one immediately.

I personally would like to hear Miss Alexander speak about what it was like to write this poem, what the pressures were, and especially.... as all poets know... what constitutes the 'out-takes.' I'm still studying not just this poem, but her other poems, which have a similar beat in more ways than one to this inaugural poem... the tropes, for instance about people doing/ people doing this and other people doing that. It's interesting.

dr.e

JillyDybka

Good for her.

kolimpah

But that's the point isn't it? For most people this is the first and last they will hear from Alexander. She had a chance to communicate something, and she seems to have failed. Rather than encouraging interest in her art she has merely reinforced the negative connotations that most people associate with modern poetry. Mainly that it is rambling, sophomoric and dull. As someone who does not feel that way about poetry, I am disappointed that Alexander represented her own art so poorly.

river

Dear Dr. E. . .i have continued to think about poetry also. . .and Elizabeth Alexander. . i hope it has not bruised her heart. . .but in some ways it has shown just how passionate the American people can be about poetry. . hope they make it a regular for inauguration . . . Elizabeth Alexander has left me wanting more public poetry. . .Not so long ago i read an account of a Native poet that went to South America and attended a public forum in a large international sports arena that was packed with families coming to hear the poets from around the world. She said people sat spell bound for the entire weekend . . . Wish the States would catch that fever. . . I wrote a letter to Dr. Maya Angelou's XM radio program where she sometimes interviews poets, i hope you do not mind Dr. E. but i asked if she could consider having you and Joy Harjo on her program as interviews for poetry and creative writing. . Hope you don't mind. . . .The two of you would of been my inaugural poet choice. . .

archangel

Dear Jilly, have you written about Miss Alexander at your site? If so, please feel free to send me a link and I'll put it at the bottom of the article here.

dr.e

archangel

Dear Kolimpah, you have a good point, that at a time when a lot of people are watching, you hope to represent the best of your work. I guess I just wonder if you can bring out the best if a certain portion is proscribed by having to be a ceremonial poem. I dont know. I just wonder.

dr.e

archangel

Dear River, once Robert Bly and I read with a bunch of Russian poets. So similar to what you pulled from your memory to describe. Audience, most of whom were Russian immigrants and longer-time RussianAmericans-- all wearing overcoats indoors (so bittersweet memories of my own people) --were avid, asked questions in depth, and when invited stood and recited poem after poem by heart. The old non-literate cultures meld with the literate ones in a lot of the people still. Harjo? I dont have the title quite right, even though I've several of her books right across the room here, "She Had Horses." A person from the dirt, for certain.

dr.e

Ghostdreams

I think it takes guts and chutzpah to show or speak or act, that is to say, to "reveal one's true self" in any way, shape or form.
It's deep and private and for some, it is a dark place, others a very quiet and still place and for others (surely for most all artists) a very sensitive area of the heart that is really quite difficult to share with others....
I mean...What if they scorn one's work, eh?
What if they laugh at us or demean our attempts to convey, in one medium or the other, our own private little worlds? Invisible friends that no one else is aware off? Worlds full of what seems to be nothing but colour where the invisible friends dwell?
What about those who love to do stick drawings? What about stick drawings?! Children do them to perfection and so many adults have forgotten how!
Why is that??
What about tossing letters in the air and finding out how they fall to start the idea .. the germination of a poem?? (IT WORKS btw! I've seen it done!)

Sorry ..Got a bit off track there for a minute but ..
I think what we're seeing happen to Ms. Alexander is a very good example of why many people don't speak of the art that they do (or show it or perform it, etc).
She shared something meaningful with us and there are these people out there....critics (??), that are absolutely heartless in their treatment of poets, sculptors, dancers, painters, writers of prose and performance artists...the list of the arts people love and do is endless ...
And so are the critics' assaults of them!
It makes me cringe to even think of her reading some of the comments that have been pasted up on the internet.
Perhaps this is why so many people describe the art that they create as a "hobby"...
If one says that what they create is nothing more than a hobby then it's still possible to back pedal when the skillet gets so hot that it scalds you half to death!
Example: "I SAID it was a hobby for gods sake! It's not like I'm a pro here! Give me a break!"
Thus stopping the flood of painful words before they go too far.
I think we're all artists of one sort or the other and attacks on works of art like this are a way to SHUT US ALL UP!
BTW, an aside:
I think we shouldn't forget the technicalities of speaking in front of such a large audience. Ms. Alexander was in perfect working order when reading her poem. She was articulate!.
The words were said clearly and surely so as to be understandable to all the people present ...all the way back to the very last row. Many times the "last row" doesn't get to hear much of anything due to the sound equipment buzzing out, people around them making too much noise, etc.
Did I rant much?
If so, my apologies. :(
Just my two cents worth.
Ghosty

river

Dr. E. . .just a quick note. . the earlier days of Harjo's works " She Had Some Horses", and a few more books of poetry. . . She has started performing with a mixture of Jazzy/Native/Blues while she plays a saxophone and clarinet interspersed as she reads the poetry in performance. . . I like the combination of poetry layered with music and the native mind that is also layered. She recently left her professor job and is performing and pursuing her art full time. . .Yes, a woman up from the ground. . . You and Robert Bly. . .now that would of been COOL!. . .

some Utube Harjo poetry reading
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WI9Irzfb73w&NR=1

Ghosty. . . just wanted to add i appreciate what you write here. . .i think a lot of people can relate to what you say. . .A number years ago i started playing with poetry. . and it is one of the things i really enjoy playing with. . . love playing with form rather than the language of poetry. . Most every day i create something that expresses energetic forms such as the yin/yang with the possibility of reading nine different poems which all hang together and can be read as one poem complete poem. . . or the energetics of the medicine wheel with 16 poems moving all together, the most fun poems i have created are 85 poems in one, attempting to express the energetics of the Sri Yantra mandala. . .I don't have desire for them to be any more than personal private expressions but the value for expression sake holds a different kind of value. . .

JillyDybka

Hi Dr E
Unfortunately my blog is on hiatus (after 5+ years) until I am finished being a guinea pig for some scientist Drs @ Vanderbilt next month. So I haven't written about the inaugural poet. She did an interview on MacNeil Lehrer: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/entertainment/ja...
Or Lehrer or whatever it is now.

archangel

dear jilly
God speed your healing. I am praying for you since you let me know a couple months ago. Be well, and best possible outcome. That's my prayer for you.

And I'll look forward to the time your blog resumes. We cannot have lovers of poetry go without such a dedicated poet like you

dr.e

archangel

dear River, I like that you have no driven-ness to make poetry but for private expression. It does hold a different value completely as you mention. Most of the peeps I admire, create because they must, feel rather ill without doing so, rather than because they want to make something for 'out there.' Although I imagine there are times for that too with some folks. Certainly when one's invited to read an inaugural poem. lol

dr.e

archangel

dear Ghost... you're right, that too, some call it lacuna... I call it refugio... 'the away place' that is also sometimes 'another time,' sometimes, 'timeless' other times heavy water.

I think that's an astute comment about trying to silence, esp young artists, by shaming or slashing at them. I personally find it pointless and wasteful of precious life. The case of the mixed media painting of the Virgin Mary made with elephant dung 'ornamentation' was a case in point... reading the slash and burn about it all in the press, and then listening to the artist humbly explain the work and the symbolism ...the takes were entirely oppositional. I have purloined insights however, knowing some of the most scathing critics personally, I know that those who are rational, fear loss of status and job if they do not continue with the screed expected from them after all this time.

I know this sounds odd, but it is in some cases a good example of their having been led into 'a bad moon on the right' by pubs who care less or nothing about pesky artists hoping to be mentioned in the rags, but instead care far more about their advertising bucks, bonuses, and stock gifts to themselves.

I personally dont believe artists and authors and poets and muscians, dancers and actors, et al, ought be escoriated and rated as though they are livestock. If they're unethical, as in violation of laws, have at it. But, as I mentioned, I'd rather see critical persons go after dictators and criminals and spend all their jing there. Far more might be effected to the good.

In an extensive survey I did of high school lit students almost ten years ago, asking them to read several weeks worth of a prominent newspaper, one of their consistent comments was that the 'reviews' --no matter written by whom-- meant nothing to them, that it was their parents' generation who needed to be told what was good and what was not, that they, the sons and daughters, decide differently; they decide for themselves by following the artists online, not the reviewers who they considered an irrelevant middleman.

I had to admire that singularity and originality of mind.

just my .02

dr.e

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