Connection: Poetry and the State of the Union Address

     Poetry is a way to use language and words to get a specific meaning across to the reader. The use of language in a poem is extremely significant. It can bring across a specific type of feeling. Language can be the most powerful thing. However, what also makes poetry is its form. Form is content. This is a specific idea we observed earlier this year in class. It was more deeply exemplified in our current study of poetry. All of these thing directly relate to one event in the United States just a week ago. That is the State of the Union address made by President Obama. President Obama used many tactics that also apply to poetry in his address.

     When President Obama made his address there was an extremely surprising thing involving the members of congress that attended this speech. That is that the members of Congress both democrats and republicans were siting together. Obama made this comment, "What comes of this moment will be determined not by whether we can sit together tonight, but whether we can work together tomorrow". Obama uses syntax here when saying this. He orders his words in an extremely interesting way. Syntax is a huge portion of poetry. Seeing that Obama used this throughout his speech connects it to poetry. The speaker and situation within this speech was also significant. Obama was speaking to what seemed for a moment to be a unified congress. But, more importantly he was delivering a State of the Union address to the people of the United States. Obama must have acknowledged this so he would know what to include in his speech. This is an important aspect of poetry. The writer must identify his audience on what he is writing about. Additionally, Obama used a professional structure when he wrote this speech and then delivered it to the people. He knew exactly what he needed to cover in his speech and structured it so that nothing that he wanted would be left out. Structure is what makes poetry. Without it, pertinent information is not received by the reader. This is also true about the speech. What was important was included, what was not was not. It speaks to how important structure is in so many forms of writing.

     In a way, Obama's State of the Union address is an act of poetry. He uses many aspects included in poetry to execute his address. A more close examination of his speech reveals many tactics used by poets within their own writing. It can be said that Obama is a poet writing his poem, the State of the Union address. Looking at his address as a work of poetry is significant because it reveals many subtle aspects that would not otherwise. These can speak to the true meaning of his address. Poetry is all around us. Everything in some way or form includes aspects of poetry. The State of the Union address is a work of poetry.

A full transcript of the State of the Union address:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/26/us/politics/26obama-text.html