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Praise Song for the Day: A Poem for Barack Obama's Presidential Inauguration, January 20, 2009
''Praise song for struggle, praise song for the day.''.... READ BY THE POET AT THE INAUGURATION OF Barack Obama
28 pages, Hardcover
First published February 6, 2009
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109 people want to read
About the author
Elizabeth Alexander
105 books457 followersElizabeth Alexander is a Quantrell Award-winning American poet, essayist, playwright, university professor, and scholar of African-American literature and culture. She teaches English language/literature, African-American literature, and gender studies at Yale University. Alexander was a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard during the 2007-08 academic year.
Alexander's poems, short stories, and critical writings have been widely published in such journals and periodicals as The Paris Review, American Poetry Review, The Kenyon Review, The Village Voice, The Women's Review of Books, and The Washington Post. Her play Diva Studies, which was performed at Yale's School of Drama, garnered her a National Endowment for the Arts creative writing fellowship as well as an Illinois Arts Council award.
On December 17th, 2008 it was announced that she will compose a poem which she shall recite at the Presidential Inauguration of Barack Obama in January 2009.
Alexander's poems, short stories, and critical writings have been widely published in such journals and periodicals as The Paris Review, American Poetry Review, The Kenyon Review, The Village Voice, The Women's Review of Books, and The Washington Post. Her play Diva Studies, which was performed at Yale's School of Drama, garnered her a National Endowment for the Arts creative writing fellowship as well as an Illinois Arts Council award.
On December 17th, 2008 it was announced that she will compose a poem which she shall recite at the Presidential Inauguration of Barack Obama in January 2009.
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Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews
November 10, 2018
Commissioned for Barack Obama's first Presidential inauguration, and read in January of 2009, Elizabeth Alexander's poem, Praise Song for the Day, is presented here in picture-book form, with artwork by Caldecott Medalist David Díaz. Offering a tribute to the hard work that built America, and the struggle that went into making it a more just society, the poem concludes as a celebration of the possibilities of this new day...
Originally published in 2009 by Graywolf Press, an independent literary publisher, Praise Song for the Day is only the fourth poem commissioned for a Presidential inauguration - the first was Robert Frost's The Gift Outright, read at President Kennedy's inauguration in 1961 - and was followed by Richard Blanco's 2013 One Today , read at Obama's second inauguration. (Bianco's poem, it should be noted, is also available in picture-book form, under the same title, illustrated by Dav Pilkey). I have to admit that I have always found Alexander's poem itself rather lackluster. There's nothing wrong with it, exactly, but it also isn't that memorable, and didn't connect with me anywhere near as much as Maya Angelou's On The Pulse Of Morning , read at President Clilnton's 1993 inauguration. I still have the yellowed copy of Angelou's poem that I cut out of The New York Times the day after the inauguration! That said, I thought David Díaz's artwork here was absolutely gorgeous, and really worked in expanding the meaning and emotional resonance of the text. Vibrant colors and a stunning folk-art sensibility make these illustrations an absolute pleasure to look at, saving this picture-book from being a somewhat indifferent read for me. Recommended primarily to David Díaz fans, as well as to those interested in inaugural poetry, a small but historically significant body of work.
Originally published in 2009 by Graywolf Press, an independent literary publisher, Praise Song for the Day is only the fourth poem commissioned for a Presidential inauguration - the first was Robert Frost's The Gift Outright, read at President Kennedy's inauguration in 1961 - and was followed by Richard Blanco's 2013 One Today , read at Obama's second inauguration. (Bianco's poem, it should be noted, is also available in picture-book form, under the same title, illustrated by Dav Pilkey). I have to admit that I have always found Alexander's poem itself rather lackluster. There's nothing wrong with it, exactly, but it also isn't that memorable, and didn't connect with me anywhere near as much as Maya Angelou's On The Pulse Of Morning , read at President Clilnton's 1993 inauguration. I still have the yellowed copy of Angelou's poem that I cut out of The New York Times the day after the inauguration! That said, I thought David Díaz's artwork here was absolutely gorgeous, and really worked in expanding the meaning and emotional resonance of the text. Vibrant colors and a stunning folk-art sensibility make these illustrations an absolute pleasure to look at, saving this picture-book from being a somewhat indifferent read for me. Recommended primarily to David Díaz fans, as well as to those interested in inaugural poetry, a small but historically significant body of work.
November 10, 2025
Picture Book Project 2025 (Book 3)
Bright, striking illustrations accompany words of hope for the future.
Bright, striking illustrations accompany words of hope for the future.
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May 29, 2021:')
March 3, 2017
This is a poem that should be shared with students in schools across the nation. Beautiful language and rhythm. Thank you, Graywolf for this beautiful printed edition!
May 17, 2017
Earlier this year, I read and wrote a column about inaugural poems. Did you know that five American poets have read or recited their poems at presidential inauguration ceremonies? For Democrats, only Democratic presidents.
John F. Kennedy, at his inauguration on January 20, 1961, instigated these special readings. He requested his personal friend Robert Frost read “The Gift Outright,” a poem first published in 1942. Frost had often called the poem “a history of the United States in a dozen (actually, sixteen) lines of blank verse.” He recited the poem at the ceremony from memory.
Maya Angelou read her poem “On the Pulse of Morning” at the January 20, 1993 inaugural of Bill Clinton. Four years later at Clinton’s second inaugural, Miller Williams read his poem “Of History and Hope.” At the January 20, 2009 ceremony for Barack Obama, Elizabeth Alexander read her poem “Praise Song for the Day.” Four years later at Obama’s second inaugural on Monday, January 21, 2013, Richard Blanco read his poem, “One Today.”
A reading of these inaugural poems may bring you special and uplifting rewards, too. I read all five and found a new-to-me poet. Elizabeth Alexander’s “Praise Song for the Day” is a fourteen stanza verse with three lines to each stanza. And a final line, “praise song for walking forward in that light.” Alexander chooses in the “winter air” someone for the members of her audience, from an ancestor to a neighbor, and walks along the “dirt roads and highways” of America with them.
Elizabeth Alexander was born May 30, 1962 in Harlem, NY. She grew up in Washington, D. C. Her father, Clifford Alexander, went to Harvard and Yale Law, served as chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and was the first African American Secretary of the Army. Her mother, Adele Logan Alexander, graduated from Radcliffe, earned a doctorate from Howard and was an adjunct history professor at George Washington University. She was recently named a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets as well as the Wun Tsun Tam Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University. She previously served as the inaugural Frederick Iseman Professor of Poetry at Yale University, where she taught for 15 years.
Although Alexander was a personal friend of Barack Obama (they taught at the University of Chicago together), his selection of an unknown poet was widely praised. Wikipedia tells us the actual poem and delivery were met with poor reception. The Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times Book editor, and most critics found that "her poem was too much like prose," and that "her delivery [was] insufficiently dramatic." The Minneapolis Star-Tribune found the poem "dull, bureaucratic” and said it proved that "the poet's place is not on the platform but in the crowd, that she should speak not for the people but to them."
Her inaugural poem spoke to me.
John F. Kennedy, at his inauguration on January 20, 1961, instigated these special readings. He requested his personal friend Robert Frost read “The Gift Outright,” a poem first published in 1942. Frost had often called the poem “a history of the United States in a dozen (actually, sixteen) lines of blank verse.” He recited the poem at the ceremony from memory.
Maya Angelou read her poem “On the Pulse of Morning” at the January 20, 1993 inaugural of Bill Clinton. Four years later at Clinton’s second inaugural, Miller Williams read his poem “Of History and Hope.” At the January 20, 2009 ceremony for Barack Obama, Elizabeth Alexander read her poem “Praise Song for the Day.” Four years later at Obama’s second inaugural on Monday, January 21, 2013, Richard Blanco read his poem, “One Today.”
A reading of these inaugural poems may bring you special and uplifting rewards, too. I read all five and found a new-to-me poet. Elizabeth Alexander’s “Praise Song for the Day” is a fourteen stanza verse with three lines to each stanza. And a final line, “praise song for walking forward in that light.” Alexander chooses in the “winter air” someone for the members of her audience, from an ancestor to a neighbor, and walks along the “dirt roads and highways” of America with them.
Elizabeth Alexander was born May 30, 1962 in Harlem, NY. She grew up in Washington, D. C. Her father, Clifford Alexander, went to Harvard and Yale Law, served as chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and was the first African American Secretary of the Army. Her mother, Adele Logan Alexander, graduated from Radcliffe, earned a doctorate from Howard and was an adjunct history professor at George Washington University. She was recently named a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets as well as the Wun Tsun Tam Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University. She previously served as the inaugural Frederick Iseman Professor of Poetry at Yale University, where she taught for 15 years.
Although Alexander was a personal friend of Barack Obama (they taught at the University of Chicago together), his selection of an unknown poet was widely praised. Wikipedia tells us the actual poem and delivery were met with poor reception. The Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times Book editor, and most critics found that "her poem was too much like prose," and that "her delivery [was] insufficiently dramatic." The Minneapolis Star-Tribune found the poem "dull, bureaucratic” and said it proved that "the poet's place is not on the platform but in the crowd, that she should speak not for the people but to them."
Her inaugural poem spoke to me.
February 4, 2019
Love this every time....
April 11, 2021
Great book! The poem is beautiful but loved the illustrations by David Diaz even more.
March 29, 2012
Elizabeth Alexander, Praise Song for the Day (Graywolf Press, 2009)
However I may feel about the man whose election occasioned this piece, I am an unreserved fan of Elizabeth Alexander's (viz. review of The Venus Hottentot 19Aug2008), and so it was only a matter of time before I picked this up and gave it a go. And I have no problems with the piece itself, which sounds very much a piece of its circumstances, full of despair for the past and hope for the future, and written exactly as I'd expect a piece from Ms. Alexander to sound—strong and brazen and a pleasure to read, either to oneself or aloud. I do have some minor problems with the packaging, which is obviously designed to stretch the somewhat short poem out to as long as possible (printed on one side of each page with excessive whitespace, e.g.); why not just make this the centerpiece of a chapbook? In other words, what's here is great; I just wish they'd decided to throw in a bit more of it. *** ½
However I may feel about the man whose election occasioned this piece, I am an unreserved fan of Elizabeth Alexander's (viz. review of The Venus Hottentot 19Aug2008), and so it was only a matter of time before I picked this up and gave it a go. And I have no problems with the piece itself, which sounds very much a piece of its circumstances, full of despair for the past and hope for the future, and written exactly as I'd expect a piece from Ms. Alexander to sound—strong and brazen and a pleasure to read, either to oneself or aloud. I do have some minor problems with the packaging, which is obviously designed to stretch the somewhat short poem out to as long as possible (printed on one side of each page with excessive whitespace, e.g.); why not just make this the centerpiece of a chapbook? In other words, what's here is great; I just wish they'd decided to throw in a bit more of it. *** ½
February 4, 2015
I was browsing through the library stacks, in the poetry section- 811.5- when I saw a skinny book. It didn’t have a title on the spine but it read “The Inaugural Poem: On The Pulse of Morning” by Maya Angelou. I remembered watching President Obama’s second inauguration and how Richard Blanco’s “One Today” was much talked about and highly praised. I went to see if that was available in book form. It was. And, so I sought what other inaugural poems had been published and came up with “Praise Song for the Day” by Elizabeth Alexander.
Honestly, none of the poems except “One Today” made much of an impact on me but that could have been because I actually watched it. And I voted during that election so the outcome was personal for me.
I did love learning the history of the inaugural poems. And, I wonder why they aren’t part of each celebration. What an honor for the writers to share their words on such special moments!
Honestly, none of the poems except “One Today” made much of an impact on me but that could have been because I actually watched it. And I voted during that election so the outcome was personal for me.
I did love learning the history of the inaugural poems. And, I wonder why they aren’t part of each celebration. What an honor for the writers to share their words on such special moments!
May 1, 2015
Poetry that is made into a song.
This is a poem of people going forward
This is a poem about celebration
This is a poem about the brightness on the other side.
This book is for middle or high school students.
I really enjoyed this story. It is about Barack Obama's Presidential Inauguration. It has wonderfull warm colors that are similar to Picasso. This poem seems to not flow as well in thought. It seems to cover alot of areas. It would be difficult to know if this is about Barack Obam'a Inageration if I havent read it beforehand.
This is a poem of people going forward
This is a poem about celebration
This is a poem about the brightness on the other side.
This book is for middle or high school students.
I really enjoyed this story. It is about Barack Obama's Presidential Inauguration. It has wonderfull warm colors that are similar to Picasso. This poem seems to not flow as well in thought. It seems to cover alot of areas. It would be difficult to know if this is about Barack Obam'a Inageration if I havent read it beforehand.
May 11, 2009
I was lucky enough to be there on Inaugration Day and hear this one read live. Now when I read it I feel the "sharp sparkle" of that January day all over again.
I fell in love with this poem and had to purchase a copy for my own collection.
I fell in love with this poem and had to purchase a copy for my own collection.
April 11, 2009
Just beautiful
March 12, 2009
i love the mixture of ordinariness and extraordinariness in this poem. i just love it.
April 5, 2009
One little poem in a little, little book ... but, oh, the impact.
April 20, 2009
I enjoyed the imagery in this poem. Nice to be able to read it through a couple of times, after hearing it on TV during the Presidential Inauguration.
May 30, 2016
Pretty mediocre, though I appreciated the shout-out to hand-painted signs.
December 5, 2009
Inaugural poem, the reading was very compelling and I return to it often.
January 16, 2010
this poem was too long, but I was thrilled about the occasion.
September 18, 2011
Diaz' illustrations are beautiful as they help to tell the story behind this poem.
October 14, 2011
Lovely!
February 20, 2012
Beautiful, vibrant illustrations illuminate the poem commissioned for President Obama's inauguration.
February 21, 2012
Now this is interesting--a poem written for the last presidential inaugural combined with artwork and packaged as a children's picture book. It's kind of cool.
April 12, 2016
The illustrations are gorgeous and the poem beautiful, but the construct and images of the poem are not at a child point of view so this book is more for adults.
September 24, 2012
Lovely poetry about the busyness of our days and our hopes for tomorrow. The illustrations sparkle with light and vivid, deep color.
January 17, 2013
Beautiful illustrations.
September 3, 2015
My son purchased this for me when Elizabeth Alexander visited his school. She autographed it for me. Really enjoyed the poem.
August 26, 2016
Exquisite words and pictures.
Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews