Part of our series of pieces inspired by the Democratic Party’s 2024 platform.
This poem is written in what’s called a Golden Shovel form, which was devised by Terrance Hayes. In Hayes’s case, “The last words of each line in a Golden Shovel poem are, in order, words from a line or lines taken often, but not invariably, from a [Gwendolyn] Brooks poem.” In the poem below, some of the lines end, in order, with words from the underlined sentence, which is part of the DNC platform:
“America is an idea—one that has endured and evolved through war and depression, prevailed over fascism and communism, and radiated hope to far distant corners of the earth. Americans believe that diversity is our greatest strength. That protest is among the highest forms of patriotism. That our fates and fortunes are bound to rise and fall together. That even when we fall short of our highest ideals, we never stop trying to build a more perfect union.”
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Looking back to Reagan’s years, &
when I froze before alighting: That
airliner so huge, its exit door a portal
to strangeness. I felt my body protest
at everything new before me. August’s
sunset, O’Hare’s tarmac & terminal is
still fixed in my memory; & though I
laugh now, the first reaction among
many that I had then was my anticipation
that Al Capone’s men stood hot on the
runway, guns in hand, aimed at us, at me.
This idea of America, my fate’s highest
goal & heart’s strength stopped me.
Why should I die like this? What forms
had my ignorance taken? I tasted only
freedom, opportunity, knew little of
all the difficult work my body would
endure to exist here, examine patriotism.
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Twice Pushcart nominated, Ignatius Valentine Aloysius earned his MFA in Creative Writing from Northwestern University. He is the author of the literary novel Fishhead: Republic of Want, and his prose and poetry have appeared in or are forthcoming in Cold Mountain Review, Another Chicago Magazine, Olney Magazine, Trampset, Thanatos Review, Roi Fainéant, Tofu Ink Arts Press, and the Coalition for Digital Narratives, among others. He is a host and curator of the long-running reading series Sunday Salon Chicago, and he serves on the curatorial and diversity boards at Ragdale Foundation, an arts residency in Lake Forest, Illinois. Ignatius lives in Evanston and is a mayor-appointed board member of the Evanston Arts Council. He is shopping his second novel, and a poetry collection which he co-wrote with David Allen Sullivan, poet laureate of Santa Cruz, California.
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Tain Leonard-Peck writes poetry, plays, and short stories, and is completing his first novel. He is also an actor, monologist, and model. He paints and composes music, and is a competitive sailor, skier, and fencer. His work has been published in literary journals, including the 2020 Anthology of Youth Creativity on Human Rights & Social Justice, Sleet Magazine, The Elevation Review, Idle Ink, Crack The Spine Magazine, Molecule, Multiplicity Magazine, Czykmate, and others. He won Honorable Mention for the Creators of Literary Justice Award, by IHRAF, the largest human rights art festival in the world; was a finalist for #ENOUGH: Plays to End Gun Violence; and won the first place Poetry Fellowship to the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing.
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