Inaugural Poet: Elizabeth Alexander 2009

Elizabeth Alexander will be our Nation's fifth Inaugural poet: Robert Frost read "Dedication" at John F. Kennedy's (1961), Maya Angelou read "Inaugural Poem 20 January 1993" at Bill Clinton's (1993), Miller Williams read "Of History of Hope" at Bill Clinton's second inauguration (1997) and James Dickey read "The Strength of Fields" at Jimmy Carter's (1977).

Here is one of Elizabeth's poems:

Ars Poetica #100:

I Believe

Poetry, I tell my students,
is idiosyncratic. Poetry

is where we are ourselves,
(though Sterling Brown said

“Every ‘I’ is a dramatic ‘I’”)
digging in the clam flats

for the shell that snaps,
emptying the proverbial pocketbook.

Poetry is what you find
in the dirt in the corner,

overhear on the bus, God
in the details, the only way

to get from here to there.
Poetry (and now my voice is rising)

is not all love, love, love,
and I’m sorry the dog died.

Poetry (here I hear myself loudest)
is the human voice,

and are we not of interest to each other?