Throughout history, the arts have been one of the many ways communities have archived historical moments. As the country continues to navigate unprecedented times, Amanda Gorman, the first National Youth Poet Laureate, is using her creative voice to memorialize the lives lost and to reflect the growing national sentiment.
Over the weekend, Gorman shared a new poem entitled “For Alex Jeffrey Pretti,” on social media in honor of the 37-year-old ICU nurse who was fatally shot by ICE agents in Minneapolis on January 24.
“We wake with/no words, just woe/&wound. Our own country shoot/ing us in the back is not just brutal/ity; it’s jarring betrayal; not enforcement/ but execution,” Gorman’s poem begins.
This is not the first time Gorman has used the power of prose to reflect on socio-political issues. Earlier this month, the poet shared a piece honoring Renee Nicole Good, a fellow poet, a mother of three, a wife, and an unfortunate victim of ICE’s fatal brutality.
“I am horrified by the ongoing violence that ICE wages upon our community. Across our country, we are witnessing discrimination and brutality on an unconscionable scale,” she wrote at the time. “We remember and mourn not only Renee, but all those ICE has killed, including Silverio Villegas Gonzalez and Keith Porter, who were also shot by ICE. We also remember the 32 individuals who died in ICE custody last year, with 2025 marking the deadliest year in ICE’s history in over two decades.”
Nearly two weeks later, Gorman, like many Americans, is reflecting on the same brutality in the wake of Pretti’s death. While some social media users tried to criticize Gorman’s stylistic choices in her latest poem, the poet and author wasted no time addressing her critics.
Five years ago, Gorman moved audiences during President Joe Biden’s inauguration with her poem “The Hill We Climb.”
“I was blown away by how my words reverberated around the world; if anything, it proved to me that we honor King’s dream, by daring to dream big, and by, most importantly, daring to dream together,” she wrote on Instagram last year, honoring the four-year anniversary. “Only then will the loving fantasies of our better nature transform into reality. Live today, and the days to come, as a promise: the work and fight for the dream persists, and what’s more, it is not just a fight, but fate—that perhaps we are as destined for this time as it is destined for us. What a worthwhile, powerful calling only we can answer. Here with you in the hill and the climb, and whatever light lies beyond, whatever light lies within.”
