Tuesday
In days gone by, it was common to employ poets to compose poems for public events. Often such poems were an important source of income for the writers, especially if the occasion was a coronation or an important funeral. Occasional poetry (as it is called) was often written to flatter a wealthy patron, upon whom one’s livelihood depended.
To a large degree, occasional poetry has fallen out of favor. We’ve come to associate poetry more with the lyrical expression of personal emotions and feelings. Still, people will still compose poems for wedding and funerals or, more frequently, read the poems of other people. And of course, we’re accustomed now to hear poets reading at the inaugurations of Democratic (but not Republican) presidents: Robert Frost for Kennedy, James Dickey for Carter, Maya Angelou and Miller Williams for Clinton, Elizabeth Alexander and Richard Blanco for Obama, and Amanda Gorman for Biden. Therefore, Democrats at last week’s convention were not surprised with Gorman once again stepped to the podum, this time to read a poem entitled “Dream Together.”
I’ve transcribed the poem from Gorman’s oral presentation so I don’t know where the line breaks and stanza breaks fall or what punctuation she employs. Feel free to rearrange the poem as you read it.
Also as you read it, see how many allusions you can identify to historically important American documents.
Dream Together
By Amanda Gorman
We gather at this hallowed place
because we believe in the American Dream
We face a race that tests
if this country we cherish
shall perish from the earth,
and if our earth
shall perish
from this country.
It falls to us to ensure
that we do not fall
for a people that cannot stand together,
cannot stand at all.
We are one family
regardless of religion, class, or color
for what defines a patriot
is not just our love of liberty
but our love for one another.
This is loud in our country’s call
because, while we all love freedom,
it is love that frees us all.
Empathy emancipates,
making us greater
than hate or vanity.
That is the American promise,
powerful and pure.
Divided, we cannot endure
but united, we can endeavor
to humanize our democracy
and endear democracy to humanity.
And make no mistake,
cohering is the hardest task
history ever wrote.
But tomorrow is not written
by our odds of hardship
but by the audacity of our hope
by the vitality of our vote.
Only now, approaching this rare air,
are we aware that perhaps
the American dream
is no dream at all,
but instead a dare to dream together.
Like a million roots tethered,
branching up humbly,
making one tree this is our country,
from many one,
from battles won,
our freedom sung,
our kingdom come
has just begun.
We redeem this sacred scene
ready for our journey from it together;
we must birth this early republic
and achieve an unearthly summit
Let us not just believe
in the American Dream.
Let us be worthy of it.
I suspect you picked up echoes of Lincoln’s “Gettysburg Address,” Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech, and Barack Obama’s signature campaign declaration (“the audacity of hope”). And there’s also the Lord’s Prayer.
Such references were particularly important for this convention, where the Democrats were attempting to reclaim a patriotic narrative that has, too often, been wrested from them by Republicans. As Kamala Harris pointed out in her acceptance speech, for the daughter of immigrant parents–one raised in a middle class community–to have a strong shot at the presidency is a quintessentially American story.
A story worth celebrating by a poet who dares us to dream together.
