Rhina Polonia Espaillat (born January 20, 1932, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic)[1] is a bilingual Dominican-American poet and translator who is affiliated with the literary movement known as New Formalism in American poetry.

Following her 1952 interracial marriage to sculptor and labor union organizer Alfred Moskowitz, however, Espaillat drifted away from contributing to American poetry until their children had grown up and left home.

She is also well-known for writing poetry that captures the beauty of daily routine,[2] as well as poems which ironically and humorously retell stories from both the Christian Bible and Classical mythology.

[3] Furthermore, even though Espaillat grew up in a time when, "the expectation that one should overcome any non-British ancestral origins, still held sway as a prerequisite to entering the sphere of genuine Americanness",[4] Espaillat's poetry also expresses pride in being a Latina,[5] in her identity as a feminist who is also a loving and happy wife and mother, and in American patriotism rooted in gratitude for her status as a political refugee who has built a family and a successful and rewarding life for herself in the United States.

Espaillat's renderings of the poetry of Robert Frost have particularly been praised for her ability to find completely accurate Spanish equivalents for the Yankee poet's many uses of rural New England slang terms.

Espaillat's translation of a Middle Welsh poem by Dafydd ap Gwilym for the book was made in collaboration with former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams.

[21] Furthermore, Brache's duties ever since becoming Ambassador to the United States in 1934 had mainly involved defending Trujillo's public reputation, which was suffering due to reports of political assassinations, human rights abuses, and the censorship of the press.

In response, a horrified Rafael Brache wrote a letter to Trujillo which denounced the massacre and said, "he could no longer be associated with a government that had committed such a terrible criminal act.

By that time, however, "reports of Trujillo's oppression and brutality had reached international notoriety", and the United States Federal Government willingly granted political asylum to Rafael Brache, his nephew, and their dependents.

After recovering, Dulce Maria, knowing that life in New York City would be difficult, decided that her daughter would be better looked after by relatives in their homeland.

Dulce Maria then visited her own mother and siblings in Jarabacoa, said her last goodbyes, collected her sewing machine, and returned to the United States without attracting the attention of Trujillo's police.

[36] For the next two years, Espaillat was raised by her paternal grandmother and aunts in La Vega, where Spanish language poetry was always being recited out loud.

[37] In 1939, however, Espaillat's parents felt more settled in the United States and Rhina joined them[32] in a New York City apartment on West Forty-Ninth Street in Hell's Kitchen.

[38] As a young child, Espaillat rapidly learned American English and adapted very quickly to the cosmopolitan atmosphere of wartime Manhattan, but she deeply missed her loving extended family in the Dominican Republic.

In later years, she would recall hearing the verse of Teresa of Ávila, St. John of the Cross, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, José Santos Chocano,[39] and Federico García Lorca.

"Don Homero" Espaillat Brache viewed English and Spanish as, "world languages", which deserved the respect of being written and spoken properly.

Espaillat received similar fan letters from poetry lovers throughout the United States, as well as in Manila, Berlin, Rio de Janeiro, and London.

[1] Following her 1952 interracial marriage to Alfred Moskowitz, however, Espaillat drifted for a long time out of contact with the Poetry Society of America while working as a public school teacher and raising her two sons in Flushing, Queens.

[59][60][61] Espaillat attended the first West Chester University Poetry Conference, which was founded by New Formalist poets Michael Peich and Dana Gioia, in 1995 and later recalled, "I was the only Hispanic there, but I realized that these people were open to everything, that their one interest was the craft.

[68] According to biographers Nancy Kang and Silvio Torres-Saillant, Espaillat, "has also accrued a solid track record as English translator of Spanish and Latin American verse from across diverse historical periods.

[69] From other languages, Espaillat has translated into English the verse of Charles of Orleans from Middle French, Dafydd ap Gwilym from Middle Welsh, Croatian national poet Marko Marulić from Renaissance Latin, Luís Vaz de Camões from Portuguese, Bedřich Bridel from Czech, and Filipino poet Gaspar Aquino de Belén from Tagalog.

In an interview with William Baer, she said, "Whenever I speak to Hispanic groups, I tell the young people to make sure they hold onto their Spanish, and keep it clean, and constantly increase their vocabulary, just as they're doing with English.

'"[73] Espaillat has also cited the music of the Spanish classical guitar, which she first heard played by her grandmother as a child, as a major influence on her poetry.

[77] The son of Romanian Jewish immigrants with left-wing views,[78] Moskowitz was an industrial arts teacher, labor union organizer, and sculptor.

According to Esaillat's biographers Nancy Kang and Silvio Torres-Saillant, "Moskowitz brought to the household a sense of stark realism as experienced by U.S. military personnel during World War II.

This was a time when many young Americans took to the front with a profound desire to fight for freedom and justice against regimes that endorsed tyranny and oppression.

"[81] Alfred Moskowitz deferred to his wife's fame within American poetry by allowing her to continue publishing under her maiden name in literary magazines.

"[85] According to Leslie Monsour, "If an issue of social injustice is encountered, she approaches it through ironic observation, clever conceit, or worldly disillusionment, in keeping with her lifelong attraction to the Baroque and Metaphysical poets.

[11] According to her biographer Silvio Torres-Saillant of Syracuse University, "This is a no-brainer to me... She may be the one American poet with the most capricious, inclusive vision of empathy and compassion.

"[11] In a January 2021 interview, Espaillat praised senior members of the Republican Party for having urged Donald Trump in vain to concede the 2020 Presidential Election, "I am very sorry for the mistakes he has made because I am not a one-party person.