Amanda Gorman said a security guard followed her home on Friday night. The 22-year-old poet, who became the youngest inaugural poet in American history when she appeared in the possession of President Joe Biden earlier this year, says the guard said she looked “suspicious”.
“A security guard followed me on my walk home tonight,” wrote Gorman on Twitter. “He asked if I lived there because ‘you look suspicious’. I showed my keys and entered my building. He left, with no excuses. This is the reality of black girls: one day you are called an icon, the next day a threat. “
In a follow-up tweet, she wrote: “In a sense, he was right. I AM A THREAT: a threat to injustice, inequality, ignorance. Anyone who speaks the truth and walks with hope is an obvious and fatal danger. for the constituted powers. “
Gorman recited her poem “The Hill We Climb” on the steps of the United States Capitol during Mr. Biden’s opening ceremony on January 20. She said “CBS This Morning’s“Anthony Mason that she prepared for the big moment in the same way that she would prepare for any other performance.
“One of the preparations that I always do whenever I introduce myself is to say a mantra to myself, which is’ I am the daughter of black writers. We are descendants of freedom fighters who broke the chains and changed the world. They call me. ‘”
The original composition was inspired by his own experience, as “a skinny black girl descended from slaves” who dreams of “becoming president”, as well as the recent Capitol insurrection, Gorman told Mason.