Day 20: "Together let us explore the stars, conquer the deserts, eradicate disease, tap the ocean depths, and encourage the arts and commerce." -JFK

It did not get out of the 30s here today. Or so weather.com has shown, as I have not left my apartment all day. Oops. But I have a new heater, a steaming cup of tea and football is on in the background, so really, why would I need to leave?

According to my page-a-day History Channel calendar, on this day in 1961 was the inauguration of John F. Kennedy. And as the calendar explained, Robert Frost recited a poem at the ceremony entitled "The Gift Outright." Frost is one of about only five poets I enjoy, and Mom's favorite, but as I had not read this one, I googled the poem and was taken to the JFK Presidential Library, where I read it for the first time.

The Gift Outright by Robert Frost
The land was ours before we were the land’s
She was our land more than a hundred years
Before we were her people. She was ours
In Massachusetts, in Virginia,
But we were England’s, still colonials,
Possessing what we still were unpossessed by,
Possessed by what we now no more possessed.
Something we were withholding made us weak
Until we found out that it was ourselves
We were withholding from our land of living,
And forthwith found salvation in surrender.
Such as we were we gave ourselves outright
(The deed of gift was many deeds of war)
To the land vaguely realizing westward,
But still unstoried, artless, unenhanced,
Such as she was, such as she will become.

Not that it matters, but I approve. :-)