Steve's Inaugural Poem

So, the conversation turned to inaugural poetry online. I asked my former English professor colleagues what they thought of Elizabeth Alexander's poem. I didn't care for it, but the more I look at it, the more I think I was wrong. That I missed something. And Larry was justified in pointing out the incongruities of my blog post on taking African Man to DC last week. This inspired me to write a narrative poem about the Inauguration with my odd little experience in mind.

An African Man Travels to the Inauguration
January 2009

by Steve Robinson

No Kikuyu came from his lips,
Strapped to the ceiling of the mini-van.
Strapped not in bondage
Not in the belly of the boat, as cargo
But tightly tucked on top
As we slithered, salt-covered
Turnpike to turnpike
Toward monument and Mall
For the Inauguration.

This African Man was not bone and blood
But a straight stick of ebony.
No airport art was he, no--
Purchased from the artist in Nairobi,
He is worthy of museum or embassy.

This African Man stood proud and watchful
In my parents' empty Michigan home.
Could he hear bursting pipes in Winter?
Could he feel the drafty windows?
Did he know that 600 miles away
The house's errant owner wanted him to come?

So I went one night
To that dark house in the woods
And took him.
I did not ask if he would come.
And yes, I tied him up
And took him.

But this trip was no Middle Passage
No trans-Atlantic terror.
It was a simple family errand
A tedious transport of art acquisition.
Yet it seemed fitting
That this African Man
Should travel East,
Quit the quiet Winter cold
And travel toward the White House on this day
To be there.