At a dinner for the 2010 Poetry Out Loud California Finals in Sacramento, students had the chance to read one of their original poems. Because Poetry Out Loud is a poem recitation competition, it’s interesting to see how memorizing poems might influence student writing.
Cheryl Evans recites Gwendolyn Brooks’ “The Mother” on the floor of the California State Senate at the 2010 Poetry Out Loud competition.
In 2010, Cheryl Evans was a senior at Deer Valley High School in Contra Costa County. She was also a founding member of The Wolverine Writing Club. Evans was one of three county champions that night who introduced themselves as interested in “educational reform.” Poetry Out Loud was something they said our educational system should keep and develop. Members of the current U.S. House of Representatives majority, however, have mentioned the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), which organizes Poetry Out Loud, as a program to cut for deficit reduction. Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin, whose name is often mentioned as a presidential candidate for 2012, has described the NEA as “fluffery.”
As evidence that the NEA is an essential partner to quality education, watch & listen to Evans recite Gwendolyn Brook’s “The Mother” on the floor of the California State Senate:
As impressive as Evans’ public speaking skills are, it was what she wrote herself that most impressed me at Poetry Out Loud in Sacramento. At the dinner for California’s county champions, Evans stood and said from memory an original poem on the need for education reform. Given unrelenting arguments–such as in Wisconsin–to once again reduce budget deficits with policies that further diminish public education, Evans’ poem is sadly the news of the day a year later:
AMERICA, america by Cheryl Evans
I thought you were great.
Everyday I stand to not just recite,
But to confess the pledge of allegiance
Even if no one else does.
I believed in you.
Even though you became dishonest, cold-hearted and untrue.
And in 1992, I don’t even think you were prepared to raise me for society.
How you promised to protect me, and my brothers, and my sisters.
You lied! Because I sat back in 2001
And through innocent eyes I witnessed you cross the line.
But I was okay with the excuses you gave
To take my siblings away from home
To fight in another country’s gates.
But at that age I would have forgiven you for anything, America.
You were my hero.
However, as I grew older, each year you grew colder.
But maybe it was because of the man in the House at the time.
He had you in so much turmoil I thought you would never recover.
But in 2004, to my surprise, did I discover
That you still wanted him around.
Despite how my brother’s blood continued to be shed
On that other country’s ground.
Wow, America, you truly are unpredictable.
But I just sat back and laughed,
As you allowed him to take you deeper in turmoil
Then, BAM!! In 2008 your markets crash.
So now your Americans have to sit back
And watch the government fix itself.
And it remained like that for a number of months
It was the government and then it was everybody else.
But, luckily, later that year Obama is elected.
So, “YES WE CAN!”
Meant that we were no longer neglected, right?
Wrong. Because remember that we take pride in the last lines
Of America’s freedom song:
“The Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave”
Marianne Williamson was right.
She said, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate,
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.”
So I’m taking Obama out, but America…
You took that power to a whole nother level.
Especially when you put your foot on my education.
If anything, these college campuses and universities
Should be your primary obligation to invest some dedication.
And really, America, this shows how much you know.
Without education, how do you think Corporate America is going to grow?
And this is a problem how education is becoming
Harder and harder to afford.
And I always looked at it as a necessity
To maintain the flow of this world.
But how does that happen
When nearly 22,000 teachers in my state is pink slipped?
The audacity of you America. You and your budget cuts,
No mercy, just snip at whatever you care to snip.
I wonder if it has ever dawned on you
That these present Economists and Congressmen will eventually grow old,
So whose next in line to take up the load?
Now excuse me, America, as I become even firmer.
But my education is being put on the back burner
And I don’t think you understand.
You talk about health care,
Without education there will be no doctors here.
And the present doctors today will eventually grow old
So whose next in line to take up the load?
And the media is blowing up these unemployment rates.
Well have you heard what employers are looking for in employees today?
For one, their looking beyond a diploma from a high school graduation.
But with these budget cuts, tuition is expensive
And if we can’t pay tuition then we can’t get that college education.
So your unemployment rates will remain high.
And, again, the presently employed today will eventually grow old
So whose next in line to take up the load?
I’m not hating on you, America.
I am still proud to be an American.
I just hope that you remember what I’ve said, remember me.
Stop while you’re ahead before you cut us too deep.
It’s when you can first admit you have a problem,
Take different steps of action so we can live out our true creed.
So God Bless You, America because His blessings is what you need.
