Professor Elizabeth Alexander, professor of African American Studies at Yale, had the opportunity this week to read her poem “Praise Song for the Day” at Barak Obama’s inauguration. Only four other poets have been invited to speak at presidential inaugurations in our history: Robert Frost read “The Gift Outright” for JF Kennedy; James Dickey read “The Strength of Fields” for Carter; Maya Angelou read “On the Pulse of the Morning” at Clinton’s first inauguration; and Miller Williams read “Of History and Hope” at Clinton’s second inauguration.

Prof. Alexander is a talented lady that has dedicated over 20 years of her life to teaching. In addition to teaching, she pours her heart into her poetry, essays, writings, and reviews. Her efforts have earned her a number of prestigious awards including being the first winner of the Jackson Prize for Poetry awarded in 2007.

In her writings as in her teachings, Professor Alexander reflects on past and present cultural, political, economic, and social development issues that impact African American individuals. Her poem “Praise Song for the Day” is no different. The words that she selected to celebrate the historical nature of the inauguration of the first African American president painted a beautiful combination of the past, present, and future into one verse.

There has been a lot of criticism of this inaugural poem. Cited by some as “less than praise worthy”, I have found that the poem was profound in the message it invoked while the simplicity of it drove the message home. She was given the task to create an inspirational poem that symbolized the historical significance of the day, and she rose to the occasion.

On her website, in response to her invitation to speak at Obama’s inauguration, Elizabeth Alexander clearly stated her own intentions:
“Poetry is not meant to cheer; rather, poetry challenges, and moves us towards transformation. Language distilled and artfully arranged shifts our experience of the words – and the worldviews – we live in.”

In reviewing her poem, She has done just that. Let look at the challenge she has given us as a society:

In the first few stanzas Professor Alexander begins to paint a picture of how we arrived to such a time in history. So many take the past for granted. The “noise” of busyness is all around us, yet we are the sum of our ancestors. The things we do every day, we are able to do because someone before us decided to pave the way. She then goes on to remind us change occurs because someone chose to look beyond the present and take action. I love the analogy Professor Alexander used, comparing highways and dirt roads to the will of some one and then others. Sometimes change is like the process of turning a dirt road into a highway. No path exists until someone first creates a footpath. From the path, a dirt road is formed. As the road picks up traffic it paves the way for a “highway” to be developed. She acknowledges that the changes leading up to this time in history began with the vision to make change happen, but a vision will never cause change until someone acts on that vision.

After beginning the poem with the analogies and reminders of the things we take for granted, she then starts her next section with the words: “Say it plain”

Ok. The analogies and time for thinking deeply about what she said is over. She makes her point clear. In history, African American people have given their blood, sweat, tears, and lives to build up our country. Their hard work and struggles are the reason we can stand together as a nation, united in praise rather than divided by color. The struggles of the past have been replaced by a praise song to the hard work that led to this point.

True to Professor Alexander’s desire to challenge and move us forward, she gave us a reminder of the past and how it led to our present, shifting our experience and moving us forward. She then brings us to a thought for the future.
There are more barriers than color. But we have erected invisible barriers of religion, thought, and creed. She emphasizes the need to look beyond those barriers and to break them down with the one word that we share in common “love”. A love that doesn’t gather others of their own kind into its net, but a love that shines outward, as Dr. Alexander stated “a widening pool of light” that has no reason to judge by any given stereotype.

After "artfully arranging our experience with words" she gives us the challenge- At any present time, we are on the edge of doing anything we put our minds to do. We just have to have a vision and move forward. The praise song shifts beyond the day- but looks forward at the greatness that we have left to achieve.


"Praise Song for the Day" .

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