Amanda Gorman, America’s youngest Poet Laureate, reading
“The Hill We Climb” at the inauguration of President Joe Biden:
“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 justice. 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.
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, 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 should make them afraid. If we’re to
live up to our own time, then victory won’t lie in the blade, but in in all of
the bridges we’ve made.
That is the promise to glade, the hill we climb if only we
dare it 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. That would destroy our country if it meant
delaying democracy, and this effort very nearly succeeded. But while democracy
can periodically be delayed, but 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 in 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
can 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 burden. 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 golden 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 in every known nook of our nation in every corner called our country
our people diverse and beautiful will emerge battered and beautiful, when the
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.”
Brava!
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ya gotta love her! I want to see more young people like her come forward and do great things!
ReplyDeleteShe is certainly the star of the moment! And good for her!
ReplyDeleteThis beautiful girl is going to be a beacon of light for all girls in years to come; the one on whose shoulders their achievements will rest. One million watts of KKK will not come close to being the lighthouse wattage that Amanda Gorman releases now
ReplyDeleteSo talented!
ReplyDeleteLoved her reading.
XOXO
A highlight indeed of the day!
ReplyDeletexoxo :-)
She's a future bright spot in out country.
ReplyDeleteAh for an entire generation of Amanda Gormans!
ReplyDeleteTruly Historic. Maya Angelou would be proud. Her successor is here.
ReplyDelete