Amanda Gorman and the Art of Being Unfinished and Imperfect

A version of this article appeared in this week’s It’s Not Just You newsletter. SUBSCRIBE HERE to have It’s Not Just You delivered to your inbox every Sunday. Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack, a crack in everything That’s how the light gets in. —Leonard Cohen I am one of those people whose scars are visible—both physical and emotional ones. The scar you notice first when you meet me is on my upper lip. It’s not a surface mark; it’s an intractable knot that bunches the skin like an imperfectly mended hem. (My less tangible scars show up in other ways; just ask my family.) Over the years, that old wound of mine, that vulnerability, has given people permission to share their own less-visible vulnerabilities with me. And I’m not the first to make this observation, but I’ve learned that no matter how together someone may seem, most of us have a private list of broken bits—the things we think we need to conceal or erase. If only we could fix those asymmetries, we tell ourselves, or fill that gap and find that missing ingredient—whether it’s a title, a certain weight, the cure for some anxiety or acceptance in a group we covet—we’ll finally feel whole. When I heard the line in Amanda Gordon’s dazzling inaugural poem where she describes the United States as “a nation that is not broken, but simply unfinished,” I thought of all...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Source Type: news