Kristine Yohe will present "Reckoning with the Past: The Historical Poetry of Frank X Walker" at The Mercantile Library in Cincinnati. Yohe will discuss selected works of former Kentucky Poet Laureate and co-founder of the Affrilachian Poets, Frank X Walker. The writer of 10 books of poetry, Walker has four that reexamine historical but often overlooked African Americans, specifically York, the enslaved man who accompanied Lewis and Clark; Isaac Murphy, an early jockey and winner of multiple Kentucky Derbies; and Medgar Evers, the civil rights leader who was assassinated by a white supremacist. Yohe will share selections from Walker’s poetry and show how his historical poems reanimate forgotten, hidden, and disempowered African American figures. Based on her forthcoming book about Walker’s historical persona poetry, this lecture will show how these works promote racial healing through reexamining prior injustice, connecting the past to today, and striving towards an anti-racist future.