Cambridge Forum dedicates an evening to the poetry and prose of Latino writer, Richard Blanco. Blanco is the first immigrant, the first Latino, the first openly gay person and the youngest person to be the U.S. inaugural poet. He was selected as the 2013 inaugural poet by President Barack Obama. His poems explore themes of Latino identity and place. In his latest memoir, The Prince of Los Cocuyos, Blanco discusses his childhood growing up in Miami as a child of Cuban-exile parents. Blanco is the author of three poetry collections: Directions to The Beach of the Dead, winner of the PEN/Beyond Margins Award; City of a Hundred Fires and Looking for The Gulf Motel. His poem Boston Strong was dedicated to the people affected by the bomb attacks that occured on April 15, 2013 during the Boston Marathon. Blanco is a fellow of the Bread Loaf Writers Conference and has taught at Georgetown and American universities. (Photo by Sam Farzaneh via [Wikimeda Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Richard_Blanco.JPG#/media/File:Richard_Blanco.JPG ""))