Houston searches for its next poet laureate
After Amanda Gorman’s reading at the Jan. 20 presidential inauguration, the online poetry library Poets.org saw a 250 percent increase in hits on its site. This statistic, and the unprecedented media attention for a poet in America, suggest that we have a hunger for the specific kind of hope found in poetry. And it speaks to the importance of poet laureates.
The week before the inauguration, poetry generated a different response locally when Mayor Sylvester Turner announced the search for the next Houston poet laureate and it made the evening news. Many of the comments on the web story were disparaging. Why pay the laureate for her two years of public service when we have potholes to fill? Why spend any tax dollars on poetry? Let’s take these questions seriously. What kind of service do poets provide a nation and a city?
When former Mayor Annise Parker decided that Houston deserved a poet laureate in 2013, I served on the selection committee. Because it was the first time, we did research on the various models and discovered only a few cities with laureate programs then; now dozens have followed suit. The group agreed that the public service that a poet laureate would perform deserved a modest stipend, and when we asked Parker to use hotel occupancy tax funds already designated for the arts, she agreed.
Since then, Houston has had four inspiring poet laureates — Gwendolyn Zepeda, Robin Davidson, Deborah D.E.E.P. Mouton and Leslie Contreras Schwartz. They have delivered hundreds of performances, service projects and free public workshops. They’ve created Houston-specific books and exhibits, all with the aim of making poetry understandable and accessible, bringing Houstonians together as a community.
Gorman, 22 , made poetry accessible to the American public at an entirely new level as the first national youth poet laureate when she performed an original poem, “The Hill We Climb,” written for the inauguration. The national media pronounced that Gorman “stole the show” at the event. In addition to the mainstream media’s reaction, Gorman’s performance elicited enthusiastic Twitter responses from celebrities such as Oprah Winfrey, Lin-Manuel Miranda and Hillary Clinton.
In scanning the myriad headlines about the inauguration, I had to wonder how Gorman’s poetry had eclipsed the likes of Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez and Garth Brooks. As I reviewed the coverage of the young poet, the word that I noticed most was “hope.”
In an interview, Gorman shared a chant she intones, eyes closed, before each of her performances:
“I am the daughter of Black writers, who are descended from Freedom Fighters, who broke the chains who changed the world. They call to me.”
In this chant, the poet aligns herself with her ancestors, and she articulates her purpose: to change the world for the better. It is her personal call to action.
What inspired hope in Gorman’s performance was its authentic description of this historic moment. Our nation is suffering, and Gorman’s poem acknowledges that. She names the division, racism and inequity that we are facing as a nation today, and makes a direct call to overcome that injustice together.
Hope is an elusive thing. What I observe in Gorman’s example is this: Poetry has the power to bring people together.
Poetry can inspire hope. Poetry prepares us to do the work of becoming a better, more just nation. Using Gorman’s metaphor, the struggle of “climbing the hill” is our most important calling. Poetry is the ignition. It is the call to action.
Having a poet laureate can bring us together as a community and as activists. Our work must follow. Houston has the opportunity to do great work and become an example in social justice, providing a vivid example to the rest of the nation. So let Houston encourage and embrace its next great poets.