Recently, Obama has been photographed, very probably, carrying around a book of Derek Walcott's poems, firing up speculation in the poetry/literary commons, of who would be those bellweather voices & notes tingling from the podium, beside Obama at his Inauguration...Walcott had been moved to write a poem about the meaning of Obama's victory.
(anyone recalling Walcott's fish-knife evisceration of the Trinadadian writer,V.S. Naipaul, "the Mongoose", at this year's Calabash Fest, would certainly want to be on his good side)
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Recall Robert Frost's New England insinuations at John F. Kennedy's swearing in (1961)...or the "occasional' poems by Maya Angelou for Clinton (1993) and by Miller Williams for Clinton's second inauguration.
Not surprisingly, Obama, who in his amazingly personal, psychologically probing memoir,
"Dreams from My Father", speaks of writing poetry, reading Frantz Fanon ("The Wretched of the Earth"), discussing "neo-colonialism, Eurocentrism, patriarchy...in effect the extensive birth pangs of his personal & political IDENTITY, would choose a
poet to further voice the emotions of his swearing in...
She is one of Calabash's own, Elizabeth Alexander...
www.calabashfestival.org/sh/authors.htm
She read on the Calabash Program, "America the Beautiful",
having, at that time, garnered Big Ups for her poems "American Sublime" (2005).
As a 1-year old child, her parents pushed her in a stroller to the
Mall in Washington D.C., where she breathed in Martin Luther King, standing in front of the Lincoln Memorial, giving his "I have A Dream" speech, whose sentiments would be fulfilled in Obama's election.
Shortly, form the other end of the Mall, with perhaps 4 million
attendees, Elizabeth's thoughts, neural passages, memories-personal & ancestral-will echo from a consecrated place.
Near a beach in Treasure Beach her stanzas will swirl.
www.elizabethalexander.net
ARS POETICA #100: I BELIEVE
...Poetry is where we are ourselves digging in the clam flats for
the shell that snaps, emptying the proverbial pocket book.
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, and I'm sorry the dog died.
Poetry (when I hear myself loudest) is the human voice,
and are we not of interest to each other?
-Elizabeth Alexander
...more reflections from the Inaugural Poet, Elizabeth Alexander:
www.poetryfoundation.org/journal/audioitem.html?id=643
In the tradition of the Calabash Fest author interviews, but absent the island vocal musicality of Kwame Dawes & Colin Channer, here are some thoughts by Elizabeth Alexander on Art & Life & the Mysteries:
www.arts.cornell.edu/reading/alexander080207.mp3
The Poet, Elizabeth Alexander, who studied with Derek Walcott at Boston University, has a reference page from the 2007 Calabash International Literary Festival...
www.calabashfestival.org/2007/sh/authors.htm