Programs and Events
Poetry Reading in celebration of Black History Month
On February 24, the Embassy’s Deputy Chief of Mission, Roberto Powers, read poetry by African-American poets Langston Hughes, Nikki Giovanni, and Maya Angelou before an audience of 45 Sudanese and American scholars at the Grand Villa Hotel in Khartoum. The poems included such favorites as Hughes’ “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” “Note on Commercial Theatre,” and “Merry-go-round,” Giovanni’s “Woman Poem” and “Nikki-Rosa,” and Angelou’s “On the Pulse of Morning,” which she read during Bill Clinton’s Presidential inauguration in 1993. Mr. Powers also offered the audience his interpretation of the Negro National Anthem, “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” Following the poetry reading, audience members, including faculty and students from Khartoum and Omdurman universities, engaged with Mr. Powers in a deeper discussion of the meanings of the poems and of the role these poets have played in the United States.
