Richard Blanco is the son of Cuban-exile parents, born in Madrid, Spain and raised in the United States, and he wrote “The Island Within” from the context of his upbringing as the son of immigrants. The poem deals with several themes that relate to personal identity and the past, including themes like exile and a sense of longing for one’s homeland.

The speaker of the poem employs a retrospective perspective in which the speaker looks back on the previous evening spent with a friend; the speaker looks even further back, on his own imaginings of Cuba, where his parents and family are from. “The Island Within” engages with the notion of memory for exiles and immigrants as the speaker and the “you” of the poem live with powerful memories of an unreachable past.

Several literary devices are present in the poem, including reference and apostrophe, and the speaker of the poem refers to neighborhoods, streets, and foods of Cuba, exploring “that unreachable island” (Line 32) through the use of vivid metaphor and imagery.

Poet Biography

Richard Blanco (1968- ), born in Madrid, Spain, immigrated with his family to the United States when he was an infant. He grew up in Miami and attended Florida International University where he earned a BS in civil engineering and a MFA in creative writing. Born into a Cuban-exile family, Blanco identifies as a Latino, immigrant, and openly gay writer.

Blanco’s awards and achievements are plentiful. In 1998, his first collection of poems, City of a Hundred Fires, was awarded the Agnes Starrett Poetry Prize, and his 2005 collection of poems, Directions to the Beach of the Dead, was honored with the PEN/American Beyond Margins Award. Having published over six collections of poetry, Blanco is a prolific and decorated writer and poet. Blanco, also performs his poetry, using his voice for activism and working with organizations like Freedom to Marry and the Tech Awards.

Blanco has published two memoirs, both of which have received honors and awards: For All of Us, One Today and The Prince of los Cocuyos. He has received a Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellowship and a Breadloaf Fellowship, and he has taught at several universities including Georgetown University and American University. As the fifth inaugural poet of the United States, Bianco is the youngest, first Latino, immigrant, and openly gay writer to receive this honor. He wrote and performed his poem “One Today” at President Barack Obama’s inauguration, which rocketed Bianco to poetic fame. Currently, Blanco lives in Bethel, Maine, and he teaches as a Distinguished Visiting Professor at Florida International University. (“Richard Blanco.” Poetry Foundation.)

Poem Text

Blanco, Richard. “The Island Within.” Poetry Foundation.

Summary

As noted in the epigraph (“For Ruth Behar”), “The Island Within” addresses Ruth Behar, a Cuban American anthropologist and writer. The speaker, speaking to Behar, represented by “you” throughout the poem, begins with a near memory that takes place at Behar’s “Victorian home” (Line 6), dancing the “mambo by the fireplace” (Line 9). The distance between America and Cuba measures “1,600 miles” Line 13, and the vastness of this separation is troubling for both Behar and the speaker. Through dancing, drinking “cafecito” (Line 14) and eating “homemade flan / floating in burnt sugar” (Lines 15-16), the two try to return to Havana, but their efforts are futile.

The image of the “island” of the poem’s title becomes clearer in the second stanza when the speaker states, “I confess I pitied you, still trying to reach / that unreachable island within the island / you still call home” (Lines 31-33), emphasizing a tone of nostalgia and longing. Memories of Cuba float through the poem, one after the other, and the speaker, who pities Behar for most of the poem, ends the poem with memories of the speaker’s own family members who remain in Cuba and the pain of all that they have lost.