Poet's Choice
At Easter time 68 years ago -- that is, within living memory -- the Daughters of the American Revolution denied permission for the black contralto Marian Anderson to sing before an integrated Washington audience in DAR Constitution Hall. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt resigned from the organization, and in a now-legendary aftermath, Anderson instead sang an open-air recital, organized by the Department of the Interior, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. She began by singing "America" before the very large, integrated audience.
This famous event is the basis for a poem by Kevin Young, serving poetry's traditional role of providing a compact, vocal record of what is worth remembering:
SPRINGTIME COMES TO THE CAPITOL
Easter, 1939
The Revolution's Step-Daughters
will not let
Marian Anderson clear
her brown throat
onstage, among the blinding lights
of Constitution Hall --
it will take a First Lady to invite
Anderson to thrill
a throng at Lincoln's stone feet.
