There’s a certain poetry to Tracy K. Smith talking about poetry. “I feel like a poem draws us, draws me, into a quieter space, a decibel level that sits below the register of the media that we live with,” she said shortly after being named poet laureate of the United States a little less than a year ago.

On the heels of the release of her latest book, Wade in the Water, Smith visits the Library to discuss her life and poetry and read from her works. Director of the creative writing program at Princeton University, she also is the author of a memoir, Ordinary Light, and three previous books of poetry including the Pulitzer Prize-winning Life on Mars.

Co-presented by the Richard J. Stern Foundation for the Arts and the City of Kansas City’s Office of Culture and Creative Services.