Read Online Call Us What We Carry by Amanda Gorman - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Amanda Gorman
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started, but nevertheless they have been irrevocably shifted, altered, displaced.
We are not all heroes, but we are all at least human. This is not a closing, but an opening, a widening—not a yawn but a scream, a poem sung. What will we admit of & into ourselves. There is no such thing as “all over” or “all done.” If we are brought any closure, it will be in us being brought closer. Oh, how neat & needed strife seems when it is storied. How we send a clean-carved arc on & on. Our tales are how this world is passed.
This timeline, naturally, will never be complete. The sample is never simple, is always insufficient at invoking the insufferable.
There is no one way to count who & what counted most to us in that dark.
These are but some of the things we overcome.
But let us come to be more than their sum.
CODA IN CODE
_ O _ _ PEN!
NOW _ PEN!
_ _ _ _ _ IT IS OVER
_ _ _ WA _ T IS OVER
THANKS FOR _ ASKING!
FIN _ _ _ _
_ _ LAST
_ _ _ ALLY
_ _ _ COME BACK
WE _ COME BACK
WE _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ WILD
WE _ _ _ _ RING
WAT _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ WE _ _ MEANT TO _ _ SEE _
WAT _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ WE _ _ MEANT TO BE _ _ _ _ †††
††† Key: The letters in this puzzle are taken from business advertisements we saw June through July 2021. People with auditory processing disorders, like the author, often have difficulty processing & recalling the order of sounds & words. The original ads for the third to last & last two sentences were, respectively:
Welcome back to the wild (advertisement for a zoo)
Watch movies like they were meant to be seen (advertisement for a movie theater)
THE UNORDINARY WORLD
The worst is over,
Depending on who you ask.
This time, we are alone,
Not by command,
But because all we’ve ever desired
Is a second of our own,
To be still & seeing,
Remote but non-distant,
Like a moon orbiting
The globe it’s most fond of.
Now that the best has begun,
Depending on who you ask,
We will be no worm,
Shrinking from all that shines.
Our future is a sea
Flooded with sun,
Our souls, so solar & soldiering.
There is a cut of that burning in us all.
Who are we, if not
What we make of the dark.
ESSEX II
As the world came apart,
We have come together.
Only we can save us.
Our faces fill with the hour,
New meaning lapping
Against us like mooned tides.
Laden with what we’ve lost,
We are led
By what we love.
As far away as it is,
The late sun looks
Peelable in our palm.
That is to say, distance
Renders all massiveness
Carriable. It is the carrying
That makes memory mutual,
The pain both private & public.
Slowly, grief becomes a gift.
When we greet it, when we listen to our loss,
When we indeed let it live,
It will not shrink in size,
But lighten in load.
It lets us breathe.
The densest despair takes
Us to no ordinary joy.
Sometimes diving
Into the deep inside us
Is the only way
We rise above it.
RESOLUTE
This rush of peace runs
So deep it roots us to the spot.
It is true that poetry
Can lamp an era scraped hollow,
A year we barely swallowed.
There is a justice in joy,
Starlit against all that
We have ended, endured &
Entered.
We will not stir stones.
We shall make mountains.
ARBORESCENT III, or ELPIS
Let us rephrase,
For we’ll say it right this time
(& isn’t that what endings are for?):
We do not hope for no reason.
Hope is the reason for itself.
We don’t care for our beloveds
For any specific, singular logic,
But, rather, for the whole of them.
That is to say,
Love is justified by loving.
Like you, we are haunted & human.
You, like us, are haunted & healing.
What we feel to be true
Can only be understood
By what it does to the body.
The same as trees,
We, too, are shaped
By how we twist
Toward all that shoots
Us through with sun.
We truly are
We are not all heroes, but we are all at least human. This is not a closing, but an opening, a widening—not a yawn but a scream, a poem sung. What will we admit of & into ourselves. There is no such thing as “all over” or “all done.” If we are brought any closure, it will be in us being brought closer. Oh, how neat & needed strife seems when it is storied. How we send a clean-carved arc on & on. Our tales are how this world is passed.
This timeline, naturally, will never be complete. The sample is never simple, is always insufficient at invoking the insufferable.
There is no one way to count who & what counted most to us in that dark.
These are but some of the things we overcome.
But let us come to be more than their sum.
CODA IN CODE
_ O _ _ PEN!
NOW _ PEN!
_ _ _ _ _ IT IS OVER
_ _ _ WA _ T IS OVER
THANKS FOR _ ASKING!
FIN _ _ _ _
_ _ LAST
_ _ _ ALLY
_ _ _ COME BACK
WE _ COME BACK
WE _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ WILD
WE _ _ _ _ RING
WAT _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ WE _ _ MEANT TO _ _ SEE _
WAT _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ WE _ _ MEANT TO BE _ _ _ _ †††
††† Key: The letters in this puzzle are taken from business advertisements we saw June through July 2021. People with auditory processing disorders, like the author, often have difficulty processing & recalling the order of sounds & words. The original ads for the third to last & last two sentences were, respectively:
Welcome back to the wild (advertisement for a zoo)
Watch movies like they were meant to be seen (advertisement for a movie theater)
THE UNORDINARY WORLD
The worst is over,
Depending on who you ask.
This time, we are alone,
Not by command,
But because all we’ve ever desired
Is a second of our own,
To be still & seeing,
Remote but non-distant,
Like a moon orbiting
The globe it’s most fond of.
Now that the best has begun,
Depending on who you ask,
We will be no worm,
Shrinking from all that shines.
Our future is a sea
Flooded with sun,
Our souls, so solar & soldiering.
There is a cut of that burning in us all.
Who are we, if not
What we make of the dark.
ESSEX II
As the world came apart,
We have come together.
Only we can save us.
Our faces fill with the hour,
New meaning lapping
Against us like mooned tides.
Laden with what we’ve lost,
We are led
By what we love.
As far away as it is,
The late sun looks
Peelable in our palm.
That is to say, distance
Renders all massiveness
Carriable. It is the carrying
That makes memory mutual,
The pain both private & public.
Slowly, grief becomes a gift.
When we greet it, when we listen to our loss,
When we indeed let it live,
It will not shrink in size,
But lighten in load.
It lets us breathe.
The densest despair takes
Us to no ordinary joy.
Sometimes diving
Into the deep inside us
Is the only way
We rise above it.
RESOLUTE
This rush of peace runs
So deep it roots us to the spot.
It is true that poetry
Can lamp an era scraped hollow,
A year we barely swallowed.
There is a justice in joy,
Starlit against all that
We have ended, endured &
Entered.
We will not stir stones.
We shall make mountains.
ARBORESCENT III, or ELPIS
Let us rephrase,
For we’ll say it right this time
(& isn’t that what endings are for?):
We do not hope for no reason.
Hope is the reason for itself.
We don’t care for our beloveds
For any specific, singular logic,
But, rather, for the whole of them.
That is to say,
Love is justified by loving.
Like you, we are haunted & human.
You, like us, are haunted & healing.
What we feel to be true
Can only be understood
By what it does to the body.
The same as trees,
We, too, are shaped
By how we twist
Toward all that shoots
Us through with sun.
We truly are
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