American heritage, Limón says it was that background that spurred her passion for poetry.
"I think being Latino is important to me in many different ways, and it influenced me in that it feels like you're always feeling like you're not completely belonging of one place or another," she said. Limón doesn't speak Spanish, so she never felt like she belonged in completely Mexican communities, but felt the same lack of connection in completely white communities. "I think it's about living in those limbo
spaces and looking for the place you belong and finding peace with your own sort of idiosyncratic music," she said. "Some of that is not about fitting in, it's really about embracing the diversity of who you are. I think that was a wonderful thing poetry gave me … I was able to not just speak for a community — no one person can do that — and not have to feel like I'm going to fit in but instead be able to put my whole self on the page and explain it that way." She says poetry gives her a wide berth to
explore who she really is. "Poetry helped make room for all different kinds of identities," she added. Te creative outlet has also given her the sense of connection she's always longed for. "One of the things poetry can offer us is that moment of pause and that moment of checking in and reminding us that we are thinking, feeling human beings, and I feel like I need that as much as everyone else," Limón said. "If that's all it gives you, just that moment of connection, I think even that is enough." It seems Librarian of Congress Carla
Hayden agrees. When announcing Limón's selection as Photos courtesy of Library of Congress
the poet laureate, Hayden said, "Ada Limón is a poet who connects. Her accessible, engaging poems ground us in where we are and who we share our world with. Tey speak of intimate truths, of the beauty and heartbreak that is living, in ways that help us move forward." Limón says that need for connection she writes about is more powerful now than ever before. "In the past three years, it's been evident that we really need it. I think about how so
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