D and I attended a poetry reading last night by Natasha Trethewey at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential library and Museum in downtown Springfield. I had first heard a few interviews of her on NPR and also first heard of her from D. She read from her books Native Guard and Thrall. I was most struck by her confident voice and her thoughts on race and being seen as “illegitimate” as a person of mixed-racial background. She emphasized the idea of mixing the personal and the historical in her poetry.
This morning I’ve been reading her work at her poets.org page.