Our goal is never revenge, just restoration. Not dominance, just dignity. Not fear, just freedom. Just justice.
Amanda Gorman
Born: March 7, 1998
Amanda Gorman (born 7 March 1998) is an American poet and social activist. She published the poetry book The One for Whom Food Is Not Enough in 2015, and became the first National Youth Poet Laureate in 2017. She studied sociology at Harvard College, and graduated cum laude as a member of Phi Beta Kappa. She received worldwide attention with her recitation of her poem "The Hill We Climb" written for the inauguration of US President Joe Biden.
Biographical information from: Wikiquote
"What is called "great"
Is often grievous & gruesome,
But what is good is worth our words,
Good trouble.
Good fight.
Good will.
Good people.
To be good is to be larger than war.
It is to be more than great."
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Jan 6: Trump supporters storm the US Capitol, leading to the deaths of five people. Somewhere a poet writes in moonless light & all at once puts her pen down.
Only when we're drowning do we understand how fierce our feet can kick.
When asking how others were faring, We did not expect an honest or full response. What words can answer how we’re remaining alive?
Somehow we've weathered and witnessed
a nation that isn't broken
but simply unfinished. . .
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
Fundamentally supremacism means doing anything to keep one's soul conceit, even if it means losing one's soul.
It means not wearing the mask that would save you, because it would mean taking off one's privilege.
It means always choosing poisonous pride over preservation,
pride over nation,
pride over anyone or anything.
This realization is not ours.
It is.
There is nothing so agonizing, or so dangerous,
as a memory unexpressed, unexplored, unexplained, &
unexploded. Grief is the grenade that always goes off.
What is now dust will not return, / not the beloveds / nor their breath, / nor the sugar-crumbling glaciers, / nor the crows chewing / on their own soured song, / nor all the species / slashed / down / in one smogged swoop.
We destroy everything good just so it will not shame us. How easy it is to both leave & love this place.
The slain fueled the lamps of a world latched to nights, our whole century brightened by blood.
Like a page, we are only legible when opened to one another.
Riots are red Violence is blue We’re sick of dying How ’bout you
& what we share is the bark, the bones. Paleontologists, from one fossilized femur, Can dream up a species, Make believe a body Where there was none. Our remnants are revelation, Our requiem as raptus. When we bend into dirt We’re truth preserved Without our skin.
Always remember that
What happened to us
Happened through us.