The River Sings and Sings On

Picture it: January 1993. I was in ninth grade. I had big ugly glasses and hair that I'd yet to learn how to control. Bill Clinton and I had run our campaigns at the same time and won — me for class president, Bill for the Real Thing. It was the first time I really cared about who we elected president and I could not have been more excited. Even back then, I was the liberal black sheep in an otherwise very white-sheep neighborhood.

I was sick that Inauguration Day. I don't remember what I had, maybe a stomach ache. Whatever the malady, it was enough to allow me to stay home, but not enough to keep me away from the television. With my big hair, white headband and giant glasses, I not only watched in awe as the man I respected more than almost anyone in the world took the oath of office, but I also heard a woman deliver a poem that would change my life. I'd always loved to read, but Maya Angelou's delivery of her Inaugural Poem made me realize for the first time the true beauty of words. How those words, meticulously chosen and placed, could roll off your tongue and into your brain and change how you viewed the world. Words, selected and polished with the care you'd reserve for aging furniture or precious keepsakes, created images that evoked anguish and elation, grief and jubilation. Hope and despair.

I cried that day, as she delivered that poem. I cried because I was 15 and I believed in the power of words to change the world, and I believed in love and goodness and hope and people and America.

And I cried today as I read it again in the privacy of my office. Because I'm 39 and I believe in the power of words to change the world, and I believe in love and goodness and hope and people and America.

Inaugural Poem

Maya Angelou
20 January 1993

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A Rock, A River, A Tree Hosts to species long since departed, Marked the mastodon. The dinosaur, who left dry tokens Of their sojourn here On our planet floor, Any broad alarm of their hastening doom Is lost in the gloom of dust and ages. But today, the Rock cries out to us, clearly, forcefully, Come, you may stand upon my Back and face your distant destiny, But seek no haven in my shadow. I will give you no more hiding place down here. You, created only a little lower than The angels, have crouched too long in The bruising darkness, Have lain too long Face down in ignorance. Your mouths spilling words Armed for slaughter. The Rock cries out today, you may stand on me, But do not hide your face. Across the wall of the world, A River sings a beautiful song, Come rest here by my side. Each of you a bordered country, Delicate and strangely made proud, Yet thrusting perpetually under siege. Your armed struggles for profit Have left collars of waste upon My shore, currents of debris upon my breast. Yet, today I call you to my riverside, If you will study war no more. Come, Clad in peace and I will sing the songs The Creator gave to me when I and the Tree and the stone were one. Before cynicism was a bloody sear across your Brow and when you yet knew you still Knew nothing. The River sings and sings on. There is a true yearning to respond to The singing River and the wise Rock. So say the Asian, the Hispanic, the Jew The African and Native American, the Sioux, The Catholic, the Muslim, the French, the Greek The Irish, the Rabbi, the Priest, the Sheikh, The Gay, the Straight, the Preacher, The privileged, the homeless, the Teacher. They hear. They all hear The speaking of the Tree. Today, the first and last of every Tree Speaks to humankind. Come to me, here beside the River. Plant yourself beside me, here beside the River. Each of you, descendant of some passed On traveller, has been paid for. You, who gave me my first name, you Pawnee, Apache and Seneca, you Cherokee Nation, who rested with me, then Forced on bloody feet, left me to the employment of Other seekers--desperate for gain, Starving for gold. You, the Turk, the Swede, the German, the Scot ... You the Ashanti, the Yoruba, the Kru, bought Sold, stolen, arriving on a nightmare Praying for a dream. Here, root yourselves beside me. I am the Tree planted by the River, Which will not be moved. I, the Rock, I the River, I the Tree I am yours--your Passages have been paid. Lift up your faces, you have a piercing need For this bright morning dawning for you. History, despite its wrenching pain, Cannot be unlived, and if faced With courage, need not be lived again. Lift up your eyes upon The day breaking for you. Give birth again To the dream. Women, children, men, Take it into the palms of your hands. Mold it into the shape of your most Private need. Sculpt it into The image of your most public self. Lift up your hearts Each new hour holds new chances For new beginnings. Do not be wedded forever To fear, yoked eternally To brutishness. The horizon leans forward, Offering you space to place new steps of change. Here, on the pulse of this fine day You may have the courage To look up and out upon me, the Rock, the River, the Tree, your country. No less to Midas than the mendicant. No less to you now than the mastodon then. Here on the pulse of this new day You may have the grace to look up and out And into your sister's eyes, into Your brother's face, your country And say simply Very simply With hope Good morning.