New Zealand poet Selina Tusitala Marsh has crafted a poem in response to Amanda Gorman’s Inauguration poem, The Hill We Climb.
Tusitala Marsh is a form New Zealand poet-laureate and was impressed by Gorman’s poem. She said the young poet’s performance crosses many world firsts.
“She is not only the youngest youth poet laureate at age 22, she’s a young black woman, working class judging by the fact her solo mother parent is a teacher at middle school and incredibly stylish. She is wearing sun yellow and blood red in her hair. She is quite elemental and of this time.”
Reflecting on Gorman’s performance, Marsh wrote the poem below titled, The Yellow Hill.
She knows why
the caged bird
sings, canary in the gold
mines singing words that sting
and heal at the same
time, wisdom sublime
in rhythm and rhyme, in Gorman time
for Biden’s
inauguration words fly free
if we are brave enough
to let them be.
