Natasha Trethewey concludes tenure as U.S. Poet Laureate

After two terms as the nation's top poet, Pulitzer Prize-winning, Emory University Professor Natasha Trethewey ends her tenure on May 14.

She’ll give a final lecture that day at the Library of Congress. If the role of the poet laureate is to champion poetry,and to encourage its consumption, Trethewey has spent the past two years doing that from Seattle to Selma, from Detroit to Dubai.

“I have found in this position that the audiences I’ve encountered have been receptive to what I’m talking about,” Trethewey said in an interview with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

But, in her travels and through her PBS “Newshour” segments, the 48-year-old writer found beauty in the raw verses written by unexpected poets, such as homeless teens in Seattle and medical students at Harvard.

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