Inaugural Poem Response

I think that the poem Praise Song for the Day by written and recited by Elizabeth Alexander means that we should be ecstatic about our new America. Now that Barack Obama is our new president we should praise that everything is going to change. Barack Obama is going to be a great president and he is going to help us change everything because if he has come this far and has given us hope why in the world would he let us down now?

This poem makes me feel like Elizabeth Alexander wants us to see how eveything is going to change soon. For example, she states in the poem:
We cross dirt roads and highways that markthe will of some one and then others,
who said I need to see what’s on the other side
I know there’s something better down the road.

We need to find a place where we are safe.
We walk into that which we cannot yet see.
Say it plain: that many have died for this day.

Sing the names of the dead who brought us here,
who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges,
picked the cotton and the lettuce,
built brick by brick the glittering edifices they would then keep clean and work inside of."

This tells me that she wants no that she knows that with Barack Obama on our side he will right what was wrong.

Some of the pharses that I really liked from the poem are:

Some live by love thy neighbor as thyself,
others by first do no harm or take no more
than you need. What if the mightiest word is love?

Love beyond marital, filial, national,
love that casts a widening pool of light,
love with no need to pre-empt grievance.

In today’s sharp sparkle, this winter air,
any thing can be made, any sentence begun.
On the brink, on the brim, on the cusp,

praise song for walking forward in that light.

And to me those phrases connect and say to me some people learn to accept each other no matter what is happening between them. Also that love is the most powerful thing in the world and no matter what that will always stay the same.

This poem really relates to Barack Obama and his life because she states in the poem:

Say it plain: that many have died for this day.
Sing the names of the dead who brought us here,

That means that people like Martin Luther King Jr., Sojourner Truth, Malcolm X,etc. have died fighting for the future of people like Barack Obama. They fought for the rights for African-Americans to have bright long futures.