The June 22nd prompt in The Daily Poet: Day-By-Day Prompts For Your Writing Practice, by Kelli Russell Agodon & Martha Silano, is to write a poem about things that happened the year you were born, using “the first line of Sandra McPherson’s ‘1943’ [I was born in the year of __] as a jumping off place.”

I was born in the year of JFK,
Beatlemania,
and ‘I have a dream’

News came out of Birmingham,
Dallas, and Mississippi—
guns and dogs and firehoses

The first woman in space
was followed by the smiley face,
touch-tone phones, and the instant replay

‘Ue o muite arukou…’
‘Ich bin ein Berliner.’
‘Danger, Will Robinson!’

Of these things, I have no memory
(my life back then was my blankey)
I know them all as part of history

(22 June 2014)

*   *   *   *   *

Notes/References:

• For Americans, 1964 was the year of Beatlemania, but it started in the UK in 1963, the year the Beatles released their first LP and did their first British tour.

• The March on Washington, where Dr. King’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech was delivered, took place on August 28, 1963.

• Birmingham became a focal point in the civil rights movement in 1963, due to the Birmingham Campaign and the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church.

• Dallas, of course, was where JFK was assassinated on November 22, 1963, and where Jack Ruby killed suspected assassin Lee Harvey Oswald two days later (this was the first murder to be broadcast on live television).

• Medgar Evers was murdered in Jackson, Mississippi on June 12, 1963.

• Valentina Tereshkova, a Soviet cosmonaut, was the first woman to travel in space. (June 16, 1963)

• The smiley face (at least, the iconic version we are familiar with today), the touch-tone telephone, and the instant replay were all introduced in 1963.

• ‘Ue o muite arukou’ (「上を向いて歩こう」) is the Kyū Sakamoto hit better known to Western audiences as ‘Sukiyaki’. Originally released in Japan in 1961, the song was a US number one in 1963—still the only Japanese-language song to ever reach the top of the American charts. (June 15, 1963; #1 on the Billboard chart for three weeks.

• Kennedy’s famous ‘Ich bin ein Berliner’ statement was delivered in a speech on June 26, 1963.

• ‘Lost in Space’ debuted September 15, 1963.

• Sadly, Wikipedia contains no entries regarding my blankey…