WATCH: Amanda Gorman reads her poem, ‘The Miracle of Morning’

Amanda Gorman is the youngest inaugural poet in memory.

The 22-year-old from Los Angeles will read a poem at President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration next week. She follows other poets -- Maya Angelou, Richard Blanco and Elizabeth Alexander, among others -- who have read their verse for incoming Democratic presidents.

Gorman’s poem “The Miracle of Morning,” was written last spring, in the early months of the coronavirus pandemic. The poem offers a pocket of hope: “While we might feel small, separate, and all alone,/ Our people have never been more closely tethered.”

Gorman told the PBS NewsHour that the poem took a while to craft.

“I feel like sculpting something out of stone, like you’re just banging the hammer trying to find the shape from within,” she said of her writing process.

Gorman was named the first Youth Poet Laureate of Los Angeles in 2014. Three years later, the Library of Congress announced she would be the country’s first National Youth Poet Laureate.

Photo by Kelia Anne

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