MIAMI, United States.- Richard Blanco, the fifth inaugural poet in the country by reading his moving poem “One Today” at the second inauguration of President Barack Obama in 2013, became the first poet laureate of Miami-Dade, according to reported this Friday The New Herald.
The son of Cuban exiles, “Richard Blanco is a champion of poetry, diversity and equity, a believer that communities come together through the arts,” Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said in a statement. that recognizes your work.
“Serving as our county’s first poet laureate, Richard will be our muse and guide, connecting residents with arts resources, events and opportunities,” he added.
Blanco, 54, grew up in Westchester and has used the city of Miami “as a source of inspiration for his work.” He is currently an adjunct professor at Florida International University (FIU), where he returned from Maine.
“Miami is, in a way, my muse and my inspiration. Much of my poetry and memoir is focused on recording and sharing the story of living and being a part of this city,” she told the Herald from his Miami Beach home.
Richard Blanco was born in Madrid, the Herald explains in its note, “but he emigrated to New York 45 days later, eventually moving to Miami with his parents and older brother, attending Christopher Columbus High School and earning a bachelor’s degree in engineering. civil and an MFA from FIU.”
The poet is the author of “Looking for the Gulf Hotel” and “Directions to the Beach of the Dead,” in which he used Miami and other parts of Florida “to examine ideas about cultural and sexual identity, family, and immigration. , and the lonely dislocation of being caught between the Cuba of his parents’ memories and the reality of his life in Westchester.”
Miami-Dade’s first poet laureate, just in time for National Poetry Month (April), looks forward to working with the mayor’s office on inclusive poetry projects and forming partnerships with the Miami Book Fair and Festival Poetry O, Miami, which is in the midst of its schedule for National Poetry Month.
Likewise, “he wants to initiate some type of cultural exchange that represents all the stories of Miami – Cuban, Venezuelan, Haitian, Colombian, Puerto Rican and others – and that poetry and other literature are more within the reach of Miamians,” reads the note.
“I grew up in a house without books, in a family of working-class exiled immigrants, and had little access to the humanities and literature,” however, “I hope to bring poetry to people who are not exposed to it,” he said. .
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