A poet who spoke at President Obama's second inauguration visited the Central Valley on Thursday.
Richard Blanco is an award winning poet who brought his talents to students at Reedley College, hoping to inspire future writers and readers.
Richard Blanco has written about his life for most of his life. The child of Cuban exiles; an immigrant to this country, he has worked in engineering and shared his experiences out of his love for the written word.
"At the end of the day, what I've found in my art and I think in art in general is that all these stories have very particular details, but they're all very universal as well," said Blanco.
Three months ago, Blanco was in our Nation's Capitol. He was asked to read his work at President Obama's second inauguration.
He shared with students how he prepared. "It was a real emotional and spiritual journey to come up with three poems in three weeks... the most important poems of my life arguably," said Blanco.
This is Blanco's second visit to Reedley College.
"There's a lot of contemporary voices and if they give poetry a chance they will realize there's somebody they can read who will reach out to them," said Blanco.