Free Thrall by Natasha Trethewey Page A

those
           they’ve named
savages,
    do they say the word itself
savagely—hissing
    Â 
that first letter,
    the serpent’s image
           releasing
    thought into speech?
For them now
    Â 
everything is flesh
    as if their thoughts, made
           suddenly corporeal,
    reveal even more
their nakedness—
    Â 
the shame of it:
    their bodies rendered
           plain as the natives’—
    homely and pale,
their ordinary sex,
    Â 
the secret illicit hairs
    that do not (cannot)
           cover enough.
    Naked as newborns,
this is how they are brought
    Â 
to knowledge. Adam and Eve
    in the New World,
           they have only the Bible
    to cover them. Think of it:
a woman holding before her
    Â 
the torn leaves of Genesis,
    and a man covering himself
           with the Good Book’s
    frontispiece—his own name
inscribed on the page.

Taxonomy
After a series of
casta
paintings by Juan Rodríguez Juárez, c. 1715
    Â 
    1. DE ESPAÑOL Y DE INDIA PRODUCE MESTISO
    Â 
The canvas is a leaden sky
    behind them, heavy
with words, gold letters inscribing
    an equation of blood—
    Â 
this plus this equals this
—as if
    a contract with nature, or
a museum label,
    ethnographic, precise. See
    Â 
how the father’s hand, beneath
    its crown of lace,
curls around his daughter’s head;
    she’s nearly fair
    Â 
as he is—
calidad.
See it
    in the brooch at her collar,
the lace framing her face.
    An infant, she is borne
    Â 
over the servant’s left shoulder,
    bound to him
by a sling, the plain blue cloth
    knotted at his throat.
    Â 
If the father, his hand
    on her skull, divines—
as the physiognomist does—
    the mysteries
    Â 
of her character, discursive,
    legible on her light flesh,
in the soft curl of her hair,
    we cannot know it: so gentle
    Â 
the eye he turns toward her.
    The mother, glancing
sideways toward him—
    the scarf on her head
    Â 
white as his face,
    his powdered wig—gestures
with one hand a shape
    like the letter C.
See,
    Â 
she seems to say,
    
what we have made.
The servant, still a child, cranes
    his neck, turns his face
    Â 
up toward all of them. He is dark
    as history, origin of the word
native:
the weight of blood,
    a pale mistress on his back,
    Â 
heavier every year.
    Â 
    2. DE ESPAÑOL Y NEGRA PRODUCE MULATO
    Â 
Still, the centuries have not dulled
the sullenness of the child’s expression.
    Â 
If there is light inside him, it does not shine
through the paint that holds his face
    Â 
in profile—his domed forehead, eyes
nearly closed beneath a heavy brow.
    Â 
Though inside, the boy’s father stands
in his cloak and hat. It’s as if he’s just come in,
    Â 
or that he’s leaving. We see him
transient, rolling a cigarette, myopic—
    Â 
his eyelids drawn against the child
passing before him. At the stove,
    Â 
the boy’s mother contorts, watchful,
her neck twisting on its spine, red beads
    Â 
yoked at her throat like a necklace of blood,
her face so black she nearly disappears
    Â 
into the canvas, the dark wall upon which
we see the words that name them.
    Â 
What should we make of any of this?
Remove the words above their