|
Books by E. Ethelbert
Miller
How We Sleep
on the Nights We Don’t Make Love
/
Fathering Words /
In
Search of Color Everywhere
First Light: New and Selected Poems /
Where are
the Love Poems for Dictators? /
Whispers, Secrets and Promises
Beyond
The Frontier: African-American Poetry for the 21st
Century /
Season of Hunger/Cry of Rain
Synergy:
An Anthology of Washington D.C. Black Poetry
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Some
folks like to listen, I still like to read. This morning
I read President Barack Obama's Inaugural speech. I
found 7 key statements around which I think historians
might look back at. Here they are:
1. Today I say
to you that the challenges we face are real. They are
serious and they are many. They will not be met easily
or in a short span of time. But know this America: They
will be met.
Here we see Obama's conviction and determination to get
things done. Will this guy be tough?
Yes, I think you'll see he is not going to be a weak
liberal. I felt this statement was directed to our
Democratic leadership on the Hill. My take is that the
Democrats in Congress are weak blockers and receivers.
The power in DC must come from the Executive Branch. Was
it symbolic that yesterday the Supreme Court Justice
didn't know what he was talking about?
2. On this day,
we come to proclaim an end to petty grievances and false
promises, the recriminations and worn-out-dogmas that
for far too long have strangled our politics. We remain
a young nation, but in the words of scripture, the time
has come to set aside childish things.
This sounds like my mother. President as parent. What
are the worn-out-dogmas? What are the childish things?
Race matters? Hmmm. Bring me the head of Cornel West.
Obama is quoting scripture here, so maybe he can walk on
water. Let's see.
3. The question
we ask today is not whether our government is too big or
too small, but whether it works...
This is the most important sentence in Obama's speech.
American history has been shaped by the role of
government. This gets to the core of who we are. This is
a Post-Katrina line. An Armstrong jazz note and a
reference to New Orleans where we saw our government not
working. This is the line that tells conservative
pundits on Fox News that folks will change the channel
in the future. It's the line that gives a Lyndon Johnson
lecture to Republican leaders.
Obama is not going to play the size game.
4. Recall that
earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not
just with missiles and tanks, but with the sturdy
alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that
our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle
us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power
grows through its prudent use. Our security emanates
from the justness of our cause, the force of our
example, the tempering qualities of humility and
restraint.
Is this President Carter without the sweater? Obama has
to be careful here or Cheney will jump out of his
wheelchair. This is good rhetoric but it can get a
nation in trouble. Send in the women- Clinton and Rice
are going to have to sell Obama's words from out of the
State Department and the United Nations. In four years
what will be the price of an Obama button and t-shirt?
Too much humility and someone down the street will take
your marbles. Hey - this happened to me once on Longwood
Avenue in the Bronx. The same neighborhood Colin Powell
lived in. Hmmm.
5. And because
we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and
segregation and emerged from that dark chapter stronger
and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old
hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe
shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller,
our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that
America must play its role in ushering in a new era of
peace.
The above statement sounds like one of those old 45
records where you have to listen to both sides. Which
side is the hit? The one you like or the one they keep
playing on the radio? Obama links the country with the
world here. But what tribe is he talking about? Africa
or folks in Alabama? We tend to be tribal when we talk
about being white or black; from Brooklyn or
Philadelphia. Didn't Rodney King want peace in LA? The
world is growing smaller, let us hope we grow bigger and
learn how to work for peace in the world.
6. To the Muslim
world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual
interest and mutual respect.
Well this was easy for him to say after using his middle
name during the oath ceremony. I like when politicians
give visibility to people. Muslims are always invisible
except in airports. Good to address the Muslim world -
must be a trip to Indonesia this spring. Now can we just
smile and say Palestinian?
7. For the world
has changed, and we must change with it.
This sounds nice but change always comes with a warranty.
Too many of us will become obsolete in the next few
years. Think Black too much and it will always be 1966.
How do we change? And what if we change our spots? Will
we look in the mirror and know who we are? Some of my
best friends are dinosaurs. Be careful of rich folks who
might continue to run the world - make the big bills -
and leave the people with the change. How much does the
future cost? What's the price of the ticket? Right about
now - I'm feeling a little James Brown coming on. Maceo!
Or should I call for Baldwin? Sam Cooke you say? Looks
like we might be here for a spell. 8 years?
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|
Inaugural Address 2009
By
President Barack Obama
My
fellow citizens: I stand here today humbled
by the task before us, grateful for the
trust you have bestowed, mindful of the
sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank
President Bush for his service to our
nation, as well as the generosity and
cooperation he has shown throughout this
transition. |
 |
Forty-four Americans have now taken
the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during
rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of
peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst
gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments,
America has carried on not simply because of the skill
or vision of those in high office, but because We the
People have remained faithful to the ideals of our
forbearers, and true to our founding documents.
So it has been. So it must be with
this generation of Americans.
That we are in the midst of crisis is
now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a
far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy
is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and
irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our
collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the
nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed;
businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our
schools fail too many; and each day brings further
evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our
adversaries and threaten our planet.
These are the indicators of crisis,
subject to data and statistics. Less measurable but no
less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land
- a nagging fear that America's decline is inevitable,
and that the next generation must lower its sights.
Today I say to you that the
challenges we face are real. They are serious and they
are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span
of time. But know this, America - they will be met.
On this day, we gather because we
have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over
conflict and discord.
On this day, we come to proclaim an
end to the petty grievances and false promises, the
recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too
long have strangled our politics.
We remain a young nation, but in the
words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside
childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our
enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry
forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on
from generation to generation: the God-given promise
that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a
chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.
In reaffirming the greatness of our
nation, we understand that greatness is never a given.
It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of
short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the
path for the faint-hearted - for those who prefer
leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches
and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the
doers, the makers of things - some celebrated but more
often men and women obscure in their labour, who have
carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity
and freedom.
For us, they packed up their few
worldly possessions and travelled across oceans in
search of a new life.
For us, they toiled in sweatshops and
settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and
plowed the hard earth.
For us, they fought and died, in
places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe
Sahn.
Time and again these men and women
struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands
were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw
America as bigger than the sum of our individual
ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or
wealth or faction.
This is the journey we continue
today. We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on
Earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this
crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods
and services no less needed than they were last week or
last month or last year. Our capacity remains
undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of
protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant
decisions - that time has surely passed. Starting today,
we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin
again the work of remaking America.
For everywhere we look, there is work
to be done. The state of the economy calls for action,
bold and swift, and we will act - not only to create new
jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will
build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and
digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us
together. We will restore science to its rightful place,
and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's
quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and
the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our
factories. And we will transform our schools and
colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new
age. All this we can do. And all this we will do.
Now, there are some who question the
scale of our ambitions - who suggest that our system
cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are
short. For they have forgotten what this country has
already done; what free men and women can achieve when
imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity
to courage.
What the cynics fail to understand is
that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the
stale political arguments that have consumed us for so
long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not
whether our government is too big or too small, but
whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs
at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement
that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to
move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end.
And those of us who manage the public's dollars will be
held to account - to spend wisely, reform bad habits,
and do our business in the light of day - because only
then can we restore the vital trust between a people and
their government.
Nor is the question before us whether
the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to
generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but
this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye,
the market can spin out of control - and that a nation
cannot prosper long when it favours only the prosperous.
The success of our economy has always depended not just
on the size of our Gross Domestic Product, but on the
reach of our prosperity; on our ability to extend
opportunity to every willing heart - not out of charity,
but because it is the surest route to our common good.
As for our common defence, we reject
as false the choice between our safety and our ideals.
Our Founding Fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely
imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and
the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of
generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we
will not give them up for expedience's sake. And so to
all other peoples and governments who are watching
today, from the grandest capitals to the small village
where my father was born: know that America is a friend
of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks
a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to
lead once more.
Recall that earlier generations faced
down fascism and communism not just with missiles and
tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring
convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot
protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please.
Instead, they knew that our power grows through its
prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of
our cause, the force of our example, the tempering
qualities of humility and restraint.
We are the keepers of this legacy.
Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those
new threats that demand even greater effort - even
greater cooperation and understanding between nations.
We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people,
and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan. With old
friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to
lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the spectre of
a warming planet. We will not apologize for our way of
life, nor will we waver in its defence, and for those
who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and
slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our
spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot
outlast us, and we will defeat you.
For we know that our patchwork
heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation
of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus - and
non-believers. We are shaped by every language and
culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because
we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and
segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger
and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old
hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe
shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller,
our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that
America must play its role in ushering in a new era of
peace.
To the Muslim world, we seek a new
way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual
respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to
sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West
- know that your people will judge you on what you can
build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power
through corruption and deceit and the silencing of
dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history;
but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to
unclench your fist.
To the people of poor nations, we
pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish
and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and
feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that
enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford
indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can
we consume the world's resources without regard to
effect. For the world has changed, and we must change
with it.
As we consider the road that unfolds
before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave
Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts
and distant mountains. They have something to tell us
today, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington
whisper through the ages. We honour them not only
because they are guardians of our liberty, but because
they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find
meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet,
at this moment - a moment that will define a generation
- it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.
For as much as government can do and
must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of
the American people upon which this nation relies. It is
the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees
break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut
their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees
us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter's
courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also
a parent's willingness to nurture a child, that finally
decides our fate.
Our challenges may be new. The
instruments with which we meet them may be new. But
those values upon which our success depends - hard work
and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and
curiosity, loyalty and patriotism - these things are
old. These things are true. They have been the quiet
force of progress throughout our history. What is
demanded then is a return to these truths. What is
required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a
recognition, on the part of every American, that we have
duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties
that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize
gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so
satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character,
than giving our all to a difficult task.
This is the price and the promise of
citizenship.
This is the source of our confidence
- the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an
uncertain destiny.
This is the meaning of our liberty
and our creed - why men and women and children of every
race and every faith can join in celebration across this
magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than
sixty years ago might not have been served at a local
restaurant can now stand before you to take a most
sacred oath.
So let us mark this day with
remembrance, of who we are and how far we have travelled.
In the year of America's birth, in the coldest of
months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying
campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was
abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained
with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our
revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation
ordered these words be read to the people:
"Let it be told to the future
world...that in the depth of winter, when nothing but
hope and virtue could survive...that the city and the
country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to
meet [it]."
America. In the face of our common
dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember
these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave
once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may
come. Let it be said by our children's children that
when we were tested we refused to let this journey end,
that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with
eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we
carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered
it safely to future generations.
Source:
NYTimes
See also
‘The
Speech’: The Experts’ Critique
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Obama’s Spare Inaugural Rhetoric
Signals Strategic Mastery—Some might argue that Obama's grand
project involves reclaiming language like that from the right. Others
might say that the fact that both liberals and conservatives could find
things to cheer in his inaugural address demonstrates that he remains a
cipher — or at least a mystery. My own view is that it's another sign
that Obama enters the White House playing the game at a very high level
strategically. He understands, as he has all along, that cohesion and
compromise are what the country wants — and what he will need if he's
going to tackle the multiplicity of crises that now officially belong to
him. In the conduct of his transition and in how he and his team have
been dealing with Capitol Hill, Obama is striving to position himself as
the head of a kind of national-unity government.
Even in less dire circumstances,
unification is what inaugurals are all about. And at a moment like this,
the imperative is only that much greater. His speech yesterday may not
have been his prettiest or most intoxicating. But it may wind up serving
a higher, more noble purpose: contributing to a climate where it's
possible to get shit done.
NYMagazine
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No Time for Poetry—PRESIDENT
Obama did not offer his patented poetry in
his Inaugural Address. He did not add to his cache of quotations in
Bartlett’s. He did not recreate J.F.K.’s inaugural, or Lincoln’s second,
or F.D.R.’s first. The great orator was mainly at his best when taking
shots at Bush and Cheney, who, in black hat and wheelchair, looked like
the misbegotten spawn of the evil Mr. Potter in “It’s a Wonderful Life”
and the Wicked Witch of the West.
Such was the judgment of many
Washington drama critics. But there’s a reason that this speech was
austere, not pretty. Form followed content. Obama wasn’t just rebuking
the outgoing administration. He was delicately but unmistakably calling
out the rest of us who went along for the ride as America swerved into
the dangerous place we find ourselves now. . . . The austerity of
Obama’s Inaugural Address seemed a tonal corrective to the glitz and the
glut. The speech was, as my friend Jack Viertel, a theater producer, put
it, “stoic, stern, crafted in slabs of granite, a slimmed-down sinewy
thing entirely evolved away from the kind of Pre-Raphaelite style of his
earlier oration.” Some of the same critics who once accused Obama of
sounding too much like a wimpy purveyor of Kumbaya now faulted him for
not rebooting those golden oldies of the campaign trail as he took his
oath. But he is no longer campaigning, and the moment for stadium cheers
has passed. . . .
Obama couldn’t give us
F.D.R.’s first inaugural address because we are not yet where
America was in 1933 — in its fourth year of downturn after the crash of
’29, with an
unemployment rate of 25 percent. But no one knows for sure that we
cannot end up there.
On Tuesday, our new president did
offer one subtle whiff of the Great Depression. His
injunction that “we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off” was
a paraphrase of
the great songwriter Dorothy Fields, who wrote that lyric for “Swing
Time” (1936), arguably the best of the escapist musicals Hollywood
churned out to lift the nation’s spirits in hard times. But Obama yoked
that light-hearted evocation of Astaire and Rogers to a call for
sacrifice that was deliberately somber, not radiantly Kennedyesque.
NYTimes
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Will Obama Save Liberalism?—We
don’t really know how Barack Obama will govern. What we have so far,
mainly, is an Inaugural Address, and it suggests that he may have
learned more from Reagan than he has sometimes let on. Obama’s speech
was unabashedly pro-American and implicitly conservative.
Obama appealed to the authority of
“our forebears,” “our founding documents,” even — political correctness
alert! — “our founding fathers.” He emphasized that “we will not
apologize for our way of life nor will we waver in its defense.” He
spoke almost not at all about rights (he had one mention of “the rights
of man,” paired with “the rule of law” in the context of a discussion of
the Constitution). He called for “a new era of responsibility.”
And he appealed to “the father of
our nation,” who, before leading his army across the Delaware on
Christmas night, 1776, allegedly “ordered these words be read to the
people: ‘Let it be told to the future world that in the depth of winter,
when nothing but hope and virtue could survive, that the city and the
country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet it.’”
For some reason, Obama didn’t
identify the author of “these timeless words” — the only words quoted in
the entire speech. He’s Thomas Paine, and the passage comes from the
first in his series of Revolutionary War tracts, “The Crisis.” Obama
chose to cloak his quotation from the sometimes intemperate Paine in the
authority of the respectable George Washington.
NYTimes
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I've read—or at
least skimmed—every inaugural address since
George Washington's, and none comes close to
so categorically rejecting the political
philosophy and legislative record of the
previous occupant of the White House. Obama
did it by stealth—so much stealth that most
of the red meat of the speech has so far
passed largely unnoticed.
“The golden trumpet” (Guardian)
Dr. Joseph Lowery
delivers Inauguration Benediction for Barack Obama
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The 5th Inning by E. Ethelbert Miller
The 5th Inning is poet and literary
activist E. Ethelbert Miller's second memoir. Coming after
Fathering Words: The Making of An
African American Writer
(published in 2000), this book finds Miller returning to
baseball, the game of his youth, in order to find the
metaphor that will provide the measurement of his life.
Almost 60, he ponders whether his life can now be entered
into the official record books as a success or failure.
The 5th Inning is one man's examination
of personal relationships, depression, love and loss. This
is a story of the individual alone on the pitching mound or
in the batters box. It's a box score filled with
remembrance. It's a combination of baseball and the blues.
To see a clip of Ethelbert reading
The 5th Inning click here:
http://www.eethelbertmiller.com/etube |
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posted 21
January 2009 |
