One of those collections where I'm not always entirely sure what's going on—but where figuring it out (and being forced to read slowly while doing so) is enjoyable all the same. ( )

Jenny Xie's spare accuracy of expression was really engaging to me from the start. The first poem in the book, Rootless, is just the beginning of a book filled with poems about traveling or living in other countries, being an immigrant, or descriptions of the dislocated foreign traveler.

Two back-to-back poems toward the beginning of the book are my favorites, Phnom Penh Diptych: Wet Season and Phnom Penh Diptych: Dry Season. There were many lines that brought to mind my experience living 7 years in South Korea...the discovery that it is just...different...not what one is used to or different ways of doing things. The experience of weather, in this case, semi-tropical rains that happen daily, and for a good portion of the year...the hectic busy activity of a city that never turns the lights out and never seems to sleep. Here is a line...

Fixtures: slack lips of suitcases, lukewarm showers up to three times in a day.
Mosquito bites on the arms and thighs, patterned like pips on dice.

An hour before midnight, the corners of the city begin to peel.
Alley of sex workers, tinny folk songs pushed through speakers.
Karaoke bars bracketed by vendors hawking salted crickets.

How do eyes and ears keep pace?

I remember having this very same thought in the first year I lived in Busan, Korea....bright neon from Karaoke bars, cars everywhere, street vendors called pojangmachas hawking exotic foods from the nearby ocean that I would have never thought were edible.

I found myself wondering how much of what she writes is autobiographical. The experience of living or traveling abroad is a common theme throughout many of the poems, but so is immigrant experience. Her brief bio on Goodreads notes that she was born in Hefei, China but was raised in New Jersey...thinking about this I found this poem particularly poignant...

NATURALIZATION
His tongue shorn, father confuses
snacks for snakes, kitchen for chicken.
It is 1992. Weekends, we paw at cheap
silverware at yard sales. I am told by mother
to keep our telephone number close,
my beaded coin purse closer. I do this.
The years are slow to pass, heavy footed.
Because the visits are frequent, we memorize
shame's numbing stench. I nurse nosebleeds,
run up and down stairways, chew the wind.
Such were the times. All of us nearsighted.
Grandmother prays for fortune
to keep us around and on a short leash.
The new country is ill fitting, lined
with cheap polyester, soiled at the sleeves

The last two lines...

This is one of several very good poetry books I have read this year. Jenny Xie's poetry in particular was readily accessible and spoke to me because of the common experience of having lived and traveled abroad for more than just a vacation. There is an economy of language, many poems with two-line stanzas that succinctly spelled out the narrative of each poem.

And the cover....yes, I know books are about what's inside but I was so drawn to the cover when I first pulled it off the shelf, I knew I would like this little volume from the start. ( )

Winner of the Walt Whitman Award ( )

I liked most of the poems in this book--some I did not quite understand.

Xie was born in China and raised in New Jersey, and the second section of poems focus on her parents' (mostly mother's) experiences in making that move, and her own experience growing up in (or regularly visiting? I wasn't clear on this) a Chinatown.

Other poems focus on herself and her personality, nature, seeing, travel, and all of these ideas together.

My favorites were the entire second section (the sections are unnamed but separated in both the table of contents and the book itself), especially Chinatown Diptych; Phnom Penh Diptych; and Tending. ( )

The author was honest and vulnerable. I'm not qualified to speak on the quality of the poetry or the verse. I know that she quickly maneuvered me back to points in my life where I experienced pain. Pain primarily as a result of fear associated with some of the themes discussed here... perception, fear of others, loneliness. There's not even a single line of bullshit in this collection. There's no pretense and if it weren't so goddamn touching and beautiful I'd say she shits on the modern day poet without ever discussing him. Some people can write, others can't. ( )

This NBA longlisted poetry collection explores the inner life and connections to people and places. The author seems to struggle with the way language is often unable to bridge the gap between the self and the outside world. Multiple poems detail observations, as if from a great distance, of various locations - Corfu, Phnom Penh, etc. Others explore failed attempts to use language for connection. ( )