Sitting in his seat, a seat broad and broken
In, sprinkled with ashes,
Pop switches channels, takes another
Shot of Seagrams, neat, and asks
What to do with me, a green young man
Who fails to consider the
Flim and flam of the world, since
Things have been easy for me;
I stare hard at his face, a stare
That deflects off his brow;
I’m sure he’s unaware of his
Dark, watery eyes, that
Glance in different directions,
And his slow, unwelcome twitches,
Fail to pass.
I listen, nod,
Listen, open, till I cling to his pale,
Beige T-shirt, yelling,
Yelling in his ears, that hang
With heavy lobes, but he’s still telling
His joke, so I ask why
He’s so unhappy, to which he replies…
But I don’t care anymore, cause
He took too damn long, and from
Under my seat, I pull out the
Mirror I’ve been saving; I’m laughing,
Laughing loud, the blood rushing from his face
To mine, as he grows small,
A spot in my brain, something
That may be squeezed out, like a
Watermelon seed between
Two fingers.
Pop takes another shot, neat,
Points out the same amber
Stain on his shorts that I’ve got on mine, and
Makes me smell his smell, coming
From me; he switches channels, recites an old poem
He wrote before his mother died,
Stands, shouts, and asks
For a hug, as I shrink, my
Arms barely reaching around
His thick, oily neck, and his broad back; ‘cause
I see my face, framed within
Pop’s black-framed glasses
And know he’s laughing too.
*****
1981 poem by future President of the United States Barack Obama, published in the journal Feast.
Featuring it in 2007 (alongside another Obama poem, “Underground”), The New Yorker noted that it “appears to be a loving if slightly jaded portrait of Obama’s maternal grandfather, with whom he spent a large part of his childhood.”
Form in Formless Times 
Obama did great things as President, for example the ACA. I wonder if he’s written more poems since 1981. If he would ever like to learn more about crafting poetry, I’m sure some of us can help him.
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It’s a nice thought. He certainly seems to have had at least a passing interest in poetry – but maybe he just found enough self-expression in other activities… And, my guess, was neither challenged to write verse in school, nor found rap as an outlet.
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The relationship between author and product is always complicated – unless author chooses to use only well-worn everyday phrases, in which case one judges that author doesn’t really believe in the nature of literature, or doesn’t appreciate it because they don’t understand it. If the author has given thought to the product, as literature, then the one-to-one equation of life and literature is far too simplistic. Is the effort designed to shape the expression to convey the contentas accurately as possible, or to impress the audience – or, indeed, to impress, exculpate, or otherwise affect the author?
That Obama chose to write poems reveals, if nothing else, a kind of sensibility which does not seem to be linked to politics, if you look at the poems. This particular poem, with its wavering account of the relationship (conscious/ subconscious/ hereditary/ not always reassuring) between the author and his maternal grandfather, suggests a self-questioning element in Obama which I (as a distant, ill-informed, English observer) find endearing but rare in Potus figures.
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Nice comments – and I agree that it would be nice to see a little more self-questioning in the current questionable creature.
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