Mississippi nativeNatasha Trethewey, author ofBellocq's OpheliaandDomestic Work, has been awarded the Grolier Poetry Prize and a Pushcart Prize. Her work was also included inThe Best American Poetry 2000. Trethewey now lives in Decatur, Georgia, and is Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Emory University. Winner of the 1999 Cave Canem Poetry Prize Winner of the 2001 Lillian Smith Book Award Winner of the 2001 Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Award In this widely celebrated debut collection of poems, Natasha Trethewey draws moving domestic portraits of families, past and present, caught in the act of earning a living and managing their households. Small moments taken from a labor-filled dayand rendered here in graceful and readable versereveal the equally hard emotional work of memory and forgetting, the extraordinary difficulty of trying to live with or without someone. "Trethewey's first book, which creates a picture of African-Americans at work, is carefully rendered from old photos, history, and memory with a loving and thoughtful eye. Her work raises one's conscience with the truths inherent in simple word combinations . . . and the care taken in ordering the pieces leads the reader from one poem to the next in graceful order."Christian Science Monitor "Trethewey's book puts women's work, and, in particular, black women's work, the hard unpretty background music of our survival, in its proper perspective. For all her meticulous control and subtle perception, this is a revolutionary book that cuts right through to the deepest places in the soul."Toi Derricotte "Trethewey's first volume of poems,Domestic Work, marks the addition of a valuable new voice to the varied cacophony of contemporary American poetry."Oxford American "In a voice confident, diverse, and directed, Trethewey'sDomestic Workdoes what a first book should, and more."Ploughshares "Trethewey'sDomestic Workdepicts an arresting psychological landscape. Her mirrors sway light and shadow over sharp portraits of people in a world between worlds. Yet, their rituals and obsessions make them like us. Seemingly straightforward and plainly spoken, woven of what dares to sound everyday, these poignant narratives are deceptive as they throw an emotional cast and the reader is beckoned to a place like no other."Yusef Komunyakaa "Trethewey's first book uses simple details to create an image of a people and the things that shape their world. The world is accessible, but in itself is not simple. It has beauty to it."Mid-American Review "Trethewey's fine first collection functions as near-social documentary . . . Trethewey evenly takes up the difficult task of preserving, and sometimes speculating upon, the people and conditions of the mostly Southern, mostly black working class."Publishers Weekly "The plain language and surface simplicity of these poems is deceptive. Their insights into the history and experience of black Americans contain a profound message for all of us . . . [This is] a noteworthy debut by a remarkable young poet."Kirkus Reviews "Selected by former poet laureate Rita Dove for the 1999 Cave Canem Poetry Prize, this debut is a marvelously assured collection exploring African-American heritage, civil rights, the work of women, and the sensuous work of the spirit. These exquisite poems are full of individuals who live, hurt, jazz, love, celebrate, sing, and, of course, work with dignity."Herman Fong, The Odyssey Bookshop (South Hadley, MA)

Mississippi native Natasha Trethewey is the recipient of the Grolier Poetry Prize and her poems have been widely published. A member of the Dark Room Collective, she currently teaches at Auburn University. This is her first book

Chapter One

    Gesture of a Woman-in-Process

--from a photograph, 1902

In the foreground, two women, their squinting faces creased into texture--

a deep relief--the lines like palms of hands I could read if I could touch.

Around them, their dailiness: clotheslines sagged with linens, a patch of greens and yams,

buckets of peas for shelling. One woman pauses for the picture. The other won't be still.

Even now, her hands circling, the white blur of her apron still in motion.

    At the Owl Club, North Gulfport, Mississippi, 1950

Nothing idle here--the men so casual, each lean, each tilted head and raised glass a moment's stay from work.

Son Dixon's center of it all, shouldering the cash register. This is where his work is: the New Orleans tailored suits,

shining keys, polished wood and mirrors of the bar. A white Cadillac out front. Money in his pocket, a good cigar.

The men gather here after work, a colored man's club. Supper served in the back--gumbo, red beans, talk of the Negro Leagues.

They repeat in leisure what they've done all day-- stand around the docks, waiting for a call, for anything to happen,

a chance to heave crates of bananas and spiders. A risky job, its only guarantee the consolation check for a dead man's family.

Their lace-up boots say shipyard . Dirt-caked trousers, yard work . Regal Quarts in hand-- It's payday man.

    Three Photographs

--by Clifton Johnson, 1902

    1. Daybook, April 1901

What luck to find them here! Through my lens, I watch them strain against motion, hold still

for my shutter to open and close-- two Negro men, clothes like church, collecting flowers in a wood,

pine needles and ivy twisting round. I think to call it Bouquets for Sweethearts , a blessing though their faces

hold little emotion. And yet, they make such good subjects. Always easy to pose,

their childlike curiosity. How well this arbor frames my shot--an intimate setting,

the boughs nestling us like brothers. How fortunate still to have found them here

instead of farther along by that old cemetery too full with new graves

and no flowers.

    2. Cabbage Vendor

Natural , he say. What he want from me? Say he gone look through that hole-- his spirit box-- and watch me sell my cabbages to make a picture hold this moment, forever. Nothing natural last forever. When I'm in my garden tearing these cabbages from earth, hearing them scream at the break, my fingers brown as dirt--that's natural. Or when I be in my kitchen frying up salt pork to cook that cabbage, them meeting in the pot like kin--that's natural. Grown cabbage and cook cabbage don't keep. Even dead don't keep same. But he will keep my picture, unnatural like hoodoo love. I could work a root of my own, turn that thing around and make him see himself like he be seeing me-- distant and small--forever.

    3. Wash Women

The eyes of eight women I don't know stare out from this photograph saying remember . Hung against these white walls, their dark faces, common as ones I've known, stand out like some distant Monday I've only heard about. I picture wash day: red beans simmering on the stove, a number three tin tub on the floor, well-water ready to boil. There's cook-starch for ironing, and some left over to eat.

I hear the laughter, three sisters speaking of penny drinks, streetcars, the movie house. A woman like my grandmother rubs linens against the washboard ribs, hymns growing in her throat. By the window, another soaks crocheted lace, then presses each delicate roll, long fingers wet and glistening. And in the doorway, the eldest shifts her milk-heavy breasts, a pile of strangers' clothes, soiled, at her feet.

But in his photograph, women do not smile, their lips a steady line connecting each quiet face. They walk the road toward home, a week's worth of take-in laundry balanced on their heads lightly as church hats. Shaded by their loads, they do not squint, their ready gaze through him, to me, straight ahead.

Copyright © 2000 Natasha Trethewey. All rights reserved.