Literary Fiction by People of Color discussion

I was inspired by Mina to seek out some poems by Natasha Trethewey. I thought these two were especially powerful. Any thoughts?

Domestic Work, 1937

All week she's cleaned
someone else's house,
stared down her own face
in the shine of copper--
bottomed pots, polished
wood, toilets she'd pull
the lid to--that look saying

Let's make a change, girl.

But Sunday mornings are hers--
church clothes starched
and hanging, a record spinning
on the console, the whole house
dancing. She raises the shades,
washes the rooms in light,
buckets of water, Octagon soap.

Cleanliness is next to godliness ...

Windows and doors flung wide,
curtains two-stepping
forward and back, neck bones
bumping in the pot, a choir
of clothes clapping on the line.

Nearer my God to Thee ...

She beats time on the rugs,
blows dust from the broom
like dandelion spores, each one
a wish for something better.

*

Theories of Time and Space

You can get there from here, though
there’s no going home.

Everywhere you go will be somewhere
you’ve never been. Try this:

head south on Mississippi 49, one-
by-one mile markers ticking off

another minute of your life. Follow this
to its natural conclusion – dead end

at the coast, the pier at Gulfport where
riggings of shrimp boats are loose stitches

in a sky threatening rain. Cross over
the man-made beach, 26 miles of sand

dumped on a mangrove swamp – buried
terrain of the past. Bring only

what you must carry – tome of memory
its random blank pages. On the dock

where you board the boat for Ship Island,
someone will take your picture:

the photograph – who you were –
will be waiting when you return

Natasha Trethewey is, without a doubt, one of my favorite poets, and Domestic Work, 1937 was the first of her poems with which I fell in love. This woman is so real to me - singing hymns and cleaning her own house for Sunday in the only time she can call her own. The date in the poem, 1937, is meaningful because I picture this woman as one of the many who jumped to take advantage of new opportunities when WWII started just a few years later. (This would normally be the point at which I would mention one of my favorite novels, This Side Of The Sky, which tells the story of 2 black women of the same period, but I'll resist!)

Wow...thank-you for sharing this! I'm definitely going to seek out more of her stuff! This is beautiful!

She beats time on the rugs,
blows dust from the broom
like dandelion spores, each one
a wish for something better.

Thanks for this, Qiana. I'm not familiar with the history, but think it rings true for many. Mina, I'm going to investigate that novel. :-)

I'm sure that you'll enjoy it, Hazel!

For those who may have missed it, Natasha Trethewey's newest work is Beyond Katrina: A Meditation on the Mississippi Gulf Coast - a combination of memoir, poetry, and reflections on the effect of Hurricane Katrina on the people of the Gulf Coast, including her own family.

I wanted to bump this thread up in honor of Natasha Trethewey's appointment as Poet Laureate today.

Here's another one:

Miscegenation by Natasha Trethewey

In 1965 my parents broke two laws of Mississippi;
they went to Ohio to marry, returned to Mississippi.

They crossed the river into Cincinnati, a city whose name
begins with a sound like sin, the sound of wrong - mis in Mississippi.

A year later they moved to Canada, followed a route the same
as slaves, the train slicing the white glaze of winter, leaving Mississippi.

Faulkner's Joe Christmas was born in winter, like Jesus, given his name
for the day he was left at the orphanage, his race unknown in Mississippi.

My father was reading War and Peace when he gave me my name.
I was born near Easter, 1966, in Mississippi.

When I turned 33 my father said, It's your Jesus year - you're the same
age he was when he died. It was spring, the hills green in Mississippi.

I know more than Joe Christmas did. Natasha is a Russian name -
though I'm not; it means Christmas child, even in Mississippi.

U.S. poet laureate Natasha Trethewey has been appointed to a second term. Librarian of Congress James Billington noted, "We don't force a broader role on any laureates, but she's done it so wonderfully," including holding weekly "office hours" with the public at the library. The Washington Post writes: "For her second term, Trethewey will expand her venue to the whole of the United States: Her signature project will involve filming a regular feature on the PBS NewsHour Poetry Series, in which she and NewsHour senior correspondent Jeffrey Brown travel the country for a series of on-location specials that examine societal issues through a poetic lens."

Wonderful! Thanks for letting us know, Beverly!