ELIZABETH ALEXANDER is the author of six books of poetry, including American Sublime, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and two collections of essays, The Black Interior and Power and Possibility. She is the first winner of the Jackson Prize for Poetry, an Anisfield-Wolf lifetime achievement awardee, and a National Endowment for the Arts and Guggenheim fellow. Alexander composed and recited “Praise Song for the Day” for the 2009 inauguration of President Barack Obama. Currently Elizabeth Alexander teaches literature and culture at Yale University, where she is the Thomas E. Donnelley Professor of African American Studies.