Jenny Xie

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 show more 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. show less

Much of this collection is Xie examining her feelings about her life as a Chinese-American, and the extreme differences in life experience held between her and her Chinese relatives. Born in China and raised in the US, Xie has (per this collection) traveled to visit family. Her language skills are not quite what she wished for--and she considers the differences in experiences and expectations, and the difficulties in communicating (how much is language? how much is outlook?).

Other sections show more have to do with other artists' work. This was all work I am not familiar with, but I am very interested in Li Zhensheng's Red-Color News Soldier. show less

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.

fiction set in Oakland CA (with a trip to Vegas) - recovering from a breakup with a man she thought she'd marry and questioning her career direction, a psychology student rebuilds her relationship with her newly sober, fit, engaged-and-in-love mother, while finding work as a professional Cuddler for lonely people craving touch. There is also a rat-owner/Influencer in a minor role.

Enjoyed this tenderly told story about a mother-daughter relationship troubled by each woman's reluctance to show more communicate their vulnerabilities in part to protect the other. interesting characters with unique problems that are nonetheless relatable. show less