There’s a lot of things that happen in January—the end of first semester, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, it starts getting really cold—but the one that weighs most on my mind is Inauguration Day, when the new administration will be formally inducted into power. Since this year’s inauguration is an objectively depressing one, let’s try and think of some ways to spice it up a bit! After all, the event can get a little boring, and a quick search online yields numerous examples of people falling asleep at the ceremony. Not to mention the cold—although the coldest Inauguration Day on record was in 1985 for Ronald Reagan’s second term, which was 7 degrees. That’s not too bad, honestly.

When trying to think of ways to improve the Inauguration, my mind went to one place: entertainment value. Now, this is a tricky one to handle, as the Inauguration is a very important event and thus demands a level of ceremony and respect. And while the impulse to create a spectacle is strong, it also wouldn’t be terribly helpful, as it would take attention away from, you know, the reason we actually have Inaugurations. We need things that are interesting, but stay on topic.

However, we only have to look back one Inauguration to see the obvious choice: poetry. Amanda Gorman’s performance of her poem, The Hill We Climb at Joe Biden’s Inauguration, was absolutely incredible! It was entertaining, thought-provoking, and was centered on topics relevant to the new administration–exactly what we need! We should be doing that more! It’s not like it’s hard to find talented people to perform—the U.S. appoints a Poet Laureate for crying out loud. We have a designated Poetry Guy! Why don’t we have them do more performances at official functions? It absolutely baffles me that in the entirety of U.S. history, only six inaugurations have incorporated poetry readings. We can and should change this, because it both provides high-quality entertainment and celebrates the fabulous poets of our country.