CARTER, POETRY, AND ME

President Jimmy Carter as president was an enigma for me. Entering the White House in 1977 he seemed to be a promise to get us finally out of the nightmare of Watergate and thus renew our nation to live up to our common ideals. Carter did have some successes like the Camp David Accords to promote peace between Egypt and Israel. However, his presidency became crippled with high gasoline prices and the Iran hostage crisis. His so-called “malaise” speech did not inspire Americans to be confident in his leadership.

I watched the beginning of this from Germany where I was serving in the US Army. I had voted for him in 1976 and would vote for his re-election in 1980 when I again became a civilian. I knew that President Carter was in trouble, yet I was shunned that Ronald Reagan soundly defeated him. Then Carter would go on to become a highly respected humanitarian who built houses for others through Habitat for Humanity, monitored international elections, and assisted in the eradication of diseases, among other activities. I was impressed by my visit to the Carter Center near downtown Atlanta. So, even conservatives like me who had come to be critical of his leadership as president but can highly praise him as a “post president.”

What brought such a transformation that perhaps no other former president achieved? For example, of the other three presidents defeated for re-election in the twentieth century, Taft came the closest to Carter as Hoover left generally embittered and Bush was too old. Yet Taft chose to continue on first as a constitutional law professor and then as a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Carter’s strong Christian faith is one clue for his post-presidency humanitarian efforts and as persuasive that may be, that answer is incomplete. After all, Hoover was a professed Quaker, a faith tradition as devoted to service as Carter’s own Baptist faith.

Another clue that perhaps is offered is Carter’s relatively young age-57 years- at the end of his presidency and his stamina in that Carter at the time I am writing this is 98 years of age, our oldest living former president. And yet, Hoover was 58 years old at the end of his presidency and lived to be 90. Another incomplete clue.

Perhaps the strongest and most complete clue to the post-presidency differences between Carter and Hoover lies in the hedgehog/fox framework which I have described in an earlier essay and to which I direct the reader to for a fuller description than will be found in this essay. At the bottom line both Carter and Hoover are/was highly intelligent engineers who possessed a hedgehog focus towards their presidencies. My hunch is that when Hoover left the White House, he continued in his hedgehog temperament tied into his bitterness at his defeat to a very popular successor.

In contrast, Carter bloomed into a fox of varied interests when he left the White House. He refused to permit the bitterness of his own defeat to a very popular successor to keep him at home in Plains. He used his vibrant Chistian faith coupled his new fox temperament to propel him back into the public arena albeit in ways unusual for former presidents.

In addition to the humanitarian efforts briefly described above, Carter has written over a dozen books, some of which I have read. Quite good. But one volume sticks out for me, and this is the only Carter book that is currently in my personal library- Always a Reckoning and Other Poems, published in 1995. It is also my only poetry book. Why? The book was a gift from my brother who bought it at a book signing in Texas, and by the way, it is autographed by the President himself.

Several things stand out for me through Carter’s poems. One, they have a simplicity about them. They are not simple- each stanza nearly explodes with a complexity of emotion and insight, and yet he does it with an economy of words. Two, the poetic content expresses the experiences of Carter in his childhood, in his family, in his work, and in politics. They are not about a fantasy land of dreams. Third, the book has been the greatest inspiration for me to write my own poems. I thought that if President Carter could write poems like this then I could also!

Several poems in Carter’s collection have impacted me in special ways. Here is a sampling-

o   “Miss Lillian Sees Leprosy for the First Time”- Carter’s mother was a Peace Corps nurse in India and how she interacts with a child with a cruel disease almost makes me teary eyed every time I read it.

o   “The Ballad of Tom Gordy”- Uncle Tom was a POW during World War ll and was pronounced dead by the government. When he returned home his family had changed far beyond what he could have imagined.

o   “The Pasture Gate”- The lives of Carter and two boyhood friends changed forever one day at a pasture gate due to the scourge of racism.

o   “A Reflection of Beauty in Washington”- When one thinks of our nation’s capital one normally thinks of power. One night from the White House roof Carter saw another perspective of capital life.

o   “Priorities of Some Mexican Children”- Granted, some poor people want a handout, but many others desire a hand up. It takes a wise person to know the difference.

So, thank you President Carter for your faith-filled contributions to our nation and planet, and also to me personally through the influence of your poetry.