November 28: Poet of the Week, Elizabeth Alexander, "Crash"

Elizabeth Alexander was the poet at President Obama's first inauguration.  I remember it clearly, watching her on that cold January morning.  She was somehow able to capture the hope of that moment with her poem.  The feeling that the United States really had changed for the better.

Elizabeth Alexander is the Poet of the Week, because she reminds Saint Marty of a better time, a kinder time.  A time when it seemed possible to walk away from a plane crash with just a couple scratches.

Crash

by:  Elizabeth Alexander

I am the last woman off of the plane

that has crashed in a cornfield near Philly,

picking through hot metal

for my rucksack and diaper bag.

No black box, no fuselage,

just sistergirl pilot wiping soot from her eyes,

happy to be alive. Her dreadlocks

will hold the smoke for weeks.

All the white passengers bailed out

before impact, so certain a sister

couldn’t navigate the crash. O gender.

O race. O ye of little faith.

Here we are in the cornfield, bruised and dirty but alive.

I invite sistergirl pilot home for dinner

at my parents’, for my mother’s roast chicken

with gravy and rice, to celebrate.