Just yesterday, Amanda asked me how I would feel if Moon decided to major in poetry.

And I was like “Oof. I don’t know.”

Because, historically, I don’t really like poetry.¹

But today?

Listen. I have a lot to say about the election, and the attempted coup, and the past year, and the last 4 or 5 years.

But today I think we should all luxuriate in the feeling of relief that we all collectively feel as people on planet Earth.

And today, I saw a young woman take the stage at Joe Biden’s inauguration and do something only a handful of people, let alone poets, have ever been able to. Amanda Gorman, 22 years old, recognized the moment. She was in it. Of it. And then she transcended it.

It was what she said, but it wasn’t just what she said. And it wasn’t just the way she said it. Or the way she presented herself in front of a velvety blue staircase in a yellow topcoat that made her look like a Disney princess. Or that “poetry” in 2021 has the same sort of esoteric, self-serving vibe that “modern art” does, and that she delivered not only the best example of what modern poetry is and can be, but as good example of any of the use of words as a means to uplift and inspire and commemorate.

It was all of it.

So yeah. Major in poetry, Moon. If you want to.

1. I don’t not like it because I don’t get it. I feel like I get it. I’ve read a ton of it, and I wrote my fair share of it, poorly, in pursuit of an English degree. I will say: writing poetry is enormously helpful in writing other stuff. The practice of choosing each and every word precisely, like poets do? That shit’s great. I think what bums me out about poetry is the preponderance of poems that are about poems, or about the act of writing poetry. Writing a poem about writing a poem just seems super self-indulgent. To me! Just me talking! People like it, and I’m stoked that they do! I like things that people don’t like. I think pineapple on pizza is the best. So, I mean.