[Newspoetry] Obama's Inaugeral Speech

[DL Emerick]

(after thank you to all the folks)

Seven score and four years ago
Our nation ended a great civil war,
We were divided in many ways.

Mr. Lincoln fought that great war to save the nation,
To keep it together, so that we could be one people --
And along the way, he freed the slaves,
Because slavery and other human misery are inherently divisive,
And are ever easily exploited.

The price of this great war was high,
For with end of slavery, the South was ravaged,
And all of the nation faced the demanding job
of building a new economy for a freer America.

Decades come and go,
With war and want destroying peace and prosperity,
For greed and hatred are the antitheses of freedom.

Today, our nation is ending another war inspired by hate;
Its economy is once more ravaged by greed and lust,
Aided and abetted by negligent and lax regulations --
And in the middle of all this bad governance,
We Americans became entrenched again in bitter divisions.

And, so, too, as we must never forget,
We are Americans, all of us,
Rich and poor, North and South, East and West,
Black or Brown, Red or White --
We are Americans and
we Americans know the World looks to us,
to see if we can restore peace and prosperity,
to ourselves and to them,
to build a new world.

Yes, we can, is my answer to the call of history.
Yes, we can be one people again.
We can end senseless wars, by overcoming hate,
We can achieve prosperity, by attacking greed and lust --
We can build a new world, restoring and preserving the planet,
And yes we can be cleaner, richer, and far more peaceful --
But only if we take up the dire problems of our times,
Take those problems as the challenges to our generation --

The time is now and we can and will succeed.
The stress here is on "we" for alone I shall fail.
I ask for your help,
for your patience,
for your sacrifice --
and together we shall overcome --
yes we can.

(yada yada conclusion)