The first US National Youth Laureate, Amanda Gorman, has written a poem to mark the death of a second protester in Minneapolis at the hands of federal immigration agents.

Gorman delivered her poem ‘The Hill We Climb’ at President Joe Biden's inauguration and previously penned a poem about the killing of Renee Good.

 

FOR ALEX JEFFREY PRETTI

murdered by I.C.E. January 24, 2026

 

by Amanda Gorman

 

We wake with

no words, just woe

& wound. Our own country shooting

us in the back is not just brutality;

it’s jarring betrayal; not enforcement,

but execution. A message: Love your people & you

will die. Yet our greatest threat isn’t the outsiders

among us, but those among us who never look

within. Fear not the those without papers, but those

without conscience. Know that to care intensively,

united, is to carry both pain-dark horror for today

& a profound, daring hope for tomorrow. We can feel

we have nothing to give, & still belove this world wait

ing, trembling to change. If we cannot find words, may

we find the will; if we ever lose hope, may we never lose our

humanity. The only undying thing is mercy, the courage to open

ourselves like doors, hug our neighbor,

& save one more bright, impossible life.

 

Background: Victim shot dead by government agents was prize-winning poet