Before I was ever a poet, my father was writing poems about me, so it was a turning of the tables when I became a poet and started answering, speaking back to his poems in ways that I had not before.
Natasha TretheweyRead
What's left is palimpsest—one memory bleeding into another, overwriting it.
Interpretation
Memories are intertwined and change over time, influencing one another.
In this quote, Natasha Trethewey suggests that our memories are not isolated events; instead, they interact and overlap, much like the layers of a palimpsest. Each memory influences the next, creating a complex tapestry of our past that can reshape our recollections and perceptions of experiences, highlighting the fluid nature of memory and identity.
In practice
In a reflective speech about personal growth, one might quote this to illustrate how past experiences shape present identity.
Before I was ever a poet, my father was writing poems about me, so it was a turning of the tables when I became a poet and started answering, speaking back to his poems in ways that I had not before.
I've been telling my students, 'Imitate, imitate.' And they say, 'Well, what if I plagiarize, or what if I'm not original? I want to be myself.' And I always tell them, 'Your self will shine through'... If you allow yourself to feel deeply and honestly, what you say won't be like anyone else.
I think that it's hard enough being an adolescent and wanting so much to fit in with your peers, your schoolmates, and to erase any sign of difference, to be part of the group. And being biracial but also being black in a predominately white school marked me as different.
'Memory.' 'Race.' 'Murder.' That's what they say about me. I am an elegiac poet. I have some historical questions, and I'm grappling with ways to make sense of history; why it still haunts us in our most intimate relationships with each other, but also in our political decisions.
For a long time, I've been interested in cultural memory and historical erasure.
Often as a poet I find that I am somewhat outside an experience I want to hold onto, consciously taking mental notes or writing them down in my journal - for fear that I will forget. It's not unlike being on a trip and taking pictures, your face behind a camera the whole time - the entire experience mediated by a lens.
Start seeing everything as God, But keep it a secret
The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience.
Often a noble face hides filthy ways.
A fully functional multiracial society cannot be achieved without a sense of history and open, honest dialogue.
God knows what you've been doing, everything you've been doing. You may fool me, but you can't fool God!
They all err - Muslims, Christians, Jews and Magians. There are two kinds of humans - the intelligent, who have no religion, and the religious, who have no intellect.
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