A Rare Recording of Poet Robert Frost Reading "The Gift Outright" at President Kennedy's Inauguration

Summary

In 1961, poet Robert Frost was invited to read at the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy. It would be the first by a poet for an inaugural ceremony. President-elect Kennedy asked Frost to recite the poem "The Gift Outright" unless the poet planned to write a poem especially for the occasion. Frost did, in fact, write a new poem for the day entitled "Dedication." However, when the time came to read, the wind and sun's glare made this impossible, though Frost made a valiant attempt. Instead, he reverted to "The Gift Outright," which he read by heart: "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."