Natasha Trethewey is a native of Gulfport, Mississippi, and the author of three collections of poetry; the most recent, Native Guard, was awarded the 2007 Pulitzer Prize. Her other awards include the 1999 Cave Canem Poetry Prize, the 2001 Lillian Smith Award for Poetry, and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts. She is the Phillis Wheatley Distinguished Chair and professor of poetry at Emory University.
Also By This Author
Joshua Cogan is a documentary photographer and anthropologist based in Washington, DC. His work for LiveHopeLove.com, based on his photojournalism alongside writer Kwame Dawes for “Hope: Living and Loving with HIV in Jamaica” (VQR, Spring 2008) was the winner of a News and Documentary Emmy Award and the Webby People’s Voice award.
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On Saturday, when I come to see
my brother, they call him, over loudspeaker,
to the tower—a small guardroom
at the entrance to the prison. I sign my name
in the book, write R0470—his number—
and agree to a search. I stand as if
I would make a snow angel in the air,
and the woman guard pats me down
lightly. Waiting for him, I consider
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