Mano Prietasha Thrall Poem Summary

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“Honesty, Conceptual and Philosophy"-De'Empress Graves . Is none other than a reflection of Thrall, by Natasha Trethewey that is a reflection of her father and her relationship. During the course of the collection Trethewey takes the reader on a journey of her life with a few exceptions. Trethewey writing is very undeviating and knowing her background also puts her poems in perspective of how she is biracial and how her father and her had special bond since her mother was murdered at a young age that alone had an imposing effect on her as a person and her writing. As expected, Thrall is a dedication to her father with poems including Elegy and Taxonomy are just the photographs and pieces to her collage by the end of the collection the reader…show more content…
Another prevalent theme in her collection is her being bi-racial white father and black mother and back then she got treated differently. She doesn’t quite write about the negative effects but, she takes the perspective of her father and how her father viewed women of color which I found to be pretty unique. “Mano Prieta” is a poem that does just that: “This is 1969 and I am three — / still light enough to be nearly the color / of my father. His armchair is a throne / and I am leaning into him, propped / against his knees — his hand draped / across my shoulder. On the chair’s arm / my mother looms above me, / perched at the edge as though / she would fall off. The camera records / her single gesture.” (Line 5-14, Page 37.) Trethewey sets the scene for the reader as she drops bread crumbs for us to follow until the end of the poem. The crust of it, is that it took place in 1969 which gives you background as of the time period which is a couple of years after anti-miscegenation laws were passed as we know even though the law was passed that their was still people that didn’t agree with it. Then the next line gives you a visual of her complexion indicating that she is still young and hasn’t developed all her color yet and from the first line you know that she is three, for readers that doesn’t know her background may not understand why it is…show more content…
The significance of these line and the reason I infer that this her mother because her mother was married to her father which is white and I feel as if they are trying to figure out what about this “negro” is so special that a white man would marry her illegally. Blood, in retrospect Trethewey uses George Fuller’s “The Quadroon, 1880” in this poem she identify the angelic smile and characteristics of her mother in the painting and I found that to be interesting compared to “Help 1968” she looked up to her and admire her courageousness: “Neither of them/ looks toward the camera; nor/do they look at each other. That year,/When my mother took me for walks,/ she was mistaken again and again/for my maid” (Page 35). People mistake her mother for a maid because of her race and when they found out she was the mother they gave her money as if she could not support Trethewey. Of course, her mother gave it back but, this poem came as a disturbance to me because to know that this was the reality of the world she lived in as a young child is very unfortunate. Thrall as a collection is build for a larger effect when they come together. All touch on, different situations or issues that are notable to Trethewey and to people who are fond of her background can connect with her on a different levels. Although, in this poem none of the poems in this collection speak

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