Artful Constitution

On Wednesdays we study the Constitution. Usually. But I’ve gotten a bit behind because I’ve spent the last two weeks on Mt. Rainier and at a music festival. Days spent in a national park reminded me that the federal government can be a force for good when the people demand it. Days spent celebrating life through music reminded me that sometimes art speaks more loudly than scholarship. So I’m skipping the clauses today in favor of a poem.

Like the Constitution, everyone in America thinks they know Emma Lazarus’ poem, The New Colossus, but few of us have ever read the whole thing. And even fewer, it seems, understand and support it’s message.

Poetry doesn’t hold the weight of law in this country, and this poem in no way accurately describes our country the way it is. But it’s about the country we should be.

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
MOTHER OF EXILES. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”