In a Young Writer's Verse, a Ruined City's Sorrow

A childhood doll was one of the only things salvaged from Trenise Robinson's family home in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. (Photos By Michael Williamson -- The Washington Post)

But there beneath lies mudbugs and slave bones

And the syncopated music of motherlands

Beating their congas and timbales, massaging the earth

With their festive feet and ash-crossed foreheads.

A few months back, Robinson applied to the Hurston/Wright Writers' Week, a prestigious summer workshop, named after the African American writers Zora Neale Hurston and Richard Wright, that takes place at American University.

She was overwhelmed with joy and appreciation when she got her acceptance letter. But she couldn't imagine how she'd come up with the $1,250 to attend. She hated to ask her mother, who'd lost her teaching job in New Orleans and was struggling to meet financial obligations.

The poet did her own nitty-gritty economic balancing: She phoned family friends in Springdale, in Prince George's County, and asked if she could stay with them during the workshop. She was able to lop off the $600 for room and board.

Then she called the Hurston-Wright program. They offered a $200 scholarship. She was now short $450.

She started a letter-writing campaign to various philanthropic organizations, pleading for help. Answers came back. "They wished me luck but said no," she says.

Her last appeal went to the New Orleans-based Tennessee Williams Literary Festival. "As the #1 fan of my writing," she wrote, "my mother would have normally found some way to scrape up the money for me to attend this program, but with our life shaken by the events of Hurricane Katrina, this possibility is a lot less likely, seeing as much of our savings have been exhausted."

The festival approved her grant.

Robinson landed in Washington on July 16.