Trethewey and Historic Erasure

Jeanette Barnes wrote a descriptive piece about a battle. When reading these lines from the poem, it feels like we are in the middle of a big war. Let`s evaluate some of these lines. "Keen to victual, nearly home, feature the sharp". This line gives a sense that victory is so close, those soldiers just need to hang on there. As if a soldier already can smell the victory but they haven`t won yet. "Each his marble pillow, astonished by the sky." The meaning this line represents is really deep. Barnes honors those heroes by praising them. She describes how hard they fought, by stating that even sky astonished their effort. One other thing could be sensed from the lines provided is that no matter a victory as always this war caused a lot of damages and left a lot of people in grief. To summarize everything we can say that this poem comes from someone who experienced the trauma of a battle. That trauma caused for this poem to be this deep. It is not just an ordinary poem about war, it is the voice of a war victim. Native Guard collection is a unique work of Natasha Trethewey. After reading some of her poems such as “Elegy for Native Guards”, “South”, and “Native Guard” I was deeply touched. These pieces carry a burden of all those soldiers that have not been recognized properly. It feels like that they have literally been erased from the history. One of the most touching lines for me was in the “Native Guard” poem: “Still, we`re called supply units – not infantry – and so we dig trenches.” It speaks the volume of how these people go unnoticed just because of their skin color. That is exactly what Charles Wright touches in the epigraph, by mentioning "White ubiquitous and the set aside Everywhere under foot". Removal of Confederate statues in many states is finally good news for this country. Honoring people that contributed to a controversial history of the United States is clueless. It is sad to see that those people have been honored, but these African American soldiers who contributed to the US History more than them gone unnoticed. Finally, though justice is taking its place. I am hoping to see one day all the American people no matter race, ethnicity, and religion unite under the one flag. That will be the real representation of United States. When that happens maybe the souls of these soldiers will rest in peace as well.