Dina Bengelsdorf Week 3 - “Maybe” - Richard Blanco

"Maybe" by Richard Blanco

For this week’s poem, I chose one of Richard Blanco’s more well known works, “Maybe”. Blanco is the youngest, first Latino and openly gay person to be named an inaugural poet (He read “One Today” for Obama’s second inauguration, which I discussed in my first blog). This poem is dedicated to and written about his former love interest, Craig. Blanco describes the experiences the two lovers shared together and reminisces on the fun times they had. I quickly noticed how heartfelt the writing was, as he was not just looking back at the fun they had but also the rights and wrongs, hence the use of the word “maybe”. He loved Craig, but failed to express those feelings outside of the times they shared. It was this lack of expression that seemed to have ended their relationship.

Blanco’s poem emits a feeling of nostalgia and almost longing to return back to the time of his relationship with Craig. He was “finally in the right place at the right time with the right person.” He remembers the “59 miles with [Craig’s] hand in mine” and presents vivid imagery of the “billboards…sun…or the sea split in two on the highway”. Just being together was all that mattered to Blanco. It seems to me that this was his experience and idea of having a soulmate. Feeling that they were the only people in the world is an emotion that I believe only true love can evoke. 

Reading the poem for the first time, the ending was disappointing. It was beautifully written, but I had hoped they would end up together. However, Blanco writes that maybe he “should’ve said something, promised you something, asked you to stay a while, maybe.” Since he failed to convey his emotions to Craig, Blanco lost what could’ve been his “person”. Based on my understanding of his memoir The Prince of Los Cocuyos, Blanco struggled with expressing his sexuality at a young age. His relationship with Craig could have ended because he would not admit to himself nor his lover that he was gay. As a result, he lost something so important to him. With his poem, Blanco teaches the reader an important lesson that I believe we can all learn from. It is important to express yourself because without facing who you really are, your life will be filled with regrets.