Richard Blanco Essay: Poetry

One Inaugural Today Richard Blanco is the son of two immigrants from Cuba: he grew up in a Cuban cohort in Miami, Florida. It was instilled in him at a young age that his ancestry and America were one in the same. They were both magical. His foreign home was talked about often, never condemned, while America was their physical home and their place to earn a better life than their previous one could afford them. Blanco’s poem, “One Today,” exhibits his cultural pride, optimism, and gratitude for life and his country: The United States. Blanco crafted his work in such a way that maneuvering from the inside out reflects the clearest picture of what I believe he was trying to say. We are all “one”: we can create subgroups and caste systems but in the end we are all humans and in America we are all different but still an enormous, culturally diverse family. Blanco reiterates this notion numerous times throughout the poem through the repetition of the word “one.” Not only is it in the title but it is also found twelve times throughout the poem itself and “our” is usually near. For example, “One ground. Our ground” (line 27), exhibits the unity and pride in where we live and the land we live on. Not only do we find shelter in this land, together, but it also lets us work it so that we can provide for ourselves. It is literally our roots (in the earth) and our metaphorical “roots” of the American Dream (wanting to be able to live off the land, have a better life than was offered elsewhere). In the same stanza, “sweat” and “hands” are repeated to emphasize the American work ethic: the willingness to build, prosper, and grow or advance through means of physical exertion and pain, if necessary. It is our desire for more and beliefs that it can be achieved that fuel our country’s progress. Blanco ties this into the issue of immigration and family, “as worn as my father’s [hands] cutting sugarcane so my brother and I could have books and shoes” (lines 32-3). Here you

Cited: Blanco, Richard. "Inaugural Poet: My Story Is America 's." CNN. Cable News Network, 22 Jan. 2013. Web. 27 Jan. 2013. Bruce, Mary. " 'One Today ': Full Text of Richard Blanco Inaugural Poem." ABC News. ABC News Network, 21 Jan. 2013. Web. 27 Jan. 2013.