Performance poet Amanda Gorman, a 22-year-old Los Angeles native, performed her poem “The Hill We Climb” as part of President Joe Biden’s Inauguration Day ceremony. Gorman is the youngest inaugural poet laureate in history. And she’s one of us, an artist/trep!
“When day comes we ask ourselves, where can we find light in this never-ending shade?”
She’s an artist because like you, she is gifted with that non-stop, perpetual streaming download of spontaneous inspiration and great ideas. She’s an entrepreneur because like you, she carries the responsibility of pushing her work and talent into the world, and must bear the consequences of that constant battle cry of doubt and resistance between her ears. And just like you, as she stepped away from the mic, she watched the faces in the crowd, for any sign of disappointment. Instead, she saw a roaring standing ovation. Of course you know all this, because you live in the same hood she does.
“We will not march back to what was, but move forward to what shall be”
Amanda is an outlier, a Beatle, a mold breaker. Her words and how she performs them stand out and apart from the dinosaur poet laureate’s of yesteryear. That’s what outliers do, they break the mold, drop jaws, raise eyebrows and cause normal folks to say, “oh my!”
“So while once we asked how could we possibly prevail over catastrophe, now we assert: How could catastrophe possibly prevail over us.”
Important because when one of us artists/treps shines so brightly, it provokes all of us to up our game.