Distributed for Tupelo Press
Lucky Fish
Poetry. Asian American Studies. LUCKY FISH travels along a lush current—a confluence of leaping vocabulary and startling formal variety, with upwelling gratitude at its source: for love, motherhood, "new hope," and the fluid and rich possibilities of words themselves. With an exuberant appetite for "my morning song, my scurry-step, my dew," anchored in complicated human situations, this astounding young poet’s third collection of poems is her strongest yet.
Table of Contents
CONTENTS
ONE
A Globe is Just an Asterisk
The Secret of Soil 3
A Globe is lustan Asterisk and Every Home Should Have an Asterisk 4
Kansas Animalia 6
Fortune-Telling Parrot 7
Letter Found at the Tower of Silence 8
Four Amulets for a Frightened Farmer 9
Corpse Flower 10
Paper Person 11
A Natural History of the Color Red 12
The Feathered Cape of Kechi (a fable) 14
At Hundred Islands National Park, I Count Only One Island 16
Kottayam Morning I7
If You Find Yourself on a Houseboat I8
At the Center for Retired Great Apes 19
Pie Plate 21
The Soils I Have Eaten 22
TWO
Sweet Tooth
TWELVE / TWELVE / TWELVE 25
Inside a Diorama 27
Mosquitoes 29
::{ concerning snake hips }:: 30
Reptilian’s Lament 32
The Mascot of Beavercreek High Breaks Her Silence 33
How to Be a Poet 34
Suppose You Were a Moray Eel 35
Bibliomancy 36
Fruit Thievery: A Lament 37
Last Summer of Singledom 38
Thanksgiving 39
Sweet Tooth 40
Baked Goods 41
Suppose You Chopped Down a Mulberry Tree 43
FOOSH 44
Dear Amy Nehzooukammyatootill, 45
Are All the Break-Ups in Your Poems Real? 46
Dear Betty Brown, 47
The Ghost-Fish Postcards 48
THREE
Lucky Penny
Hedgehog 53
Notes for the Heartbeat at My Feet 54
Birth Geographic 55
Under the Pascal Moon 60
Toy Universe 61
The Light I Collect 62
Lobison Song 64
Come Home, Come Home 65
Memorial Day Derecho 66
Eclipse 67
Waiting for Him to Speak 68
The Sick Diet 70
Two Egg, Florida 71
Inside the Happiness Factory 72
The Latch 73
Rain: A Catalog 74
Lucky Penny 75
Acknowledgments 78
ONE
A Globe is Just an Asterisk
The Secret of Soil 3
A Globe is lustan Asterisk and Every Home Should Have an Asterisk 4
Kansas Animalia 6
Fortune-Telling Parrot 7
Letter Found at the Tower of Silence 8
Four Amulets for a Frightened Farmer 9
Corpse Flower 10
Paper Person 11
A Natural History of the Color Red 12
The Feathered Cape of Kechi (a fable) 14
At Hundred Islands National Park, I Count Only One Island 16
Kottayam Morning I7
If You Find Yourself on a Houseboat I8
At the Center for Retired Great Apes 19
Pie Plate 21
The Soils I Have Eaten 22
TWO
Sweet Tooth
TWELVE / TWELVE / TWELVE 25
Inside a Diorama 27
Mosquitoes 29
::{ concerning snake hips }:: 30
Reptilian’s Lament 32
The Mascot of Beavercreek High Breaks Her Silence 33
How to Be a Poet 34
Suppose You Were a Moray Eel 35
Bibliomancy 36
Fruit Thievery: A Lament 37
Last Summer of Singledom 38
Thanksgiving 39
Sweet Tooth 40
Baked Goods 41
Suppose You Chopped Down a Mulberry Tree 43
FOOSH 44
Dear Amy Nehzooukammyatootill, 45
Are All the Break-Ups in Your Poems Real? 46
Dear Betty Brown, 47
The Ghost-Fish Postcards 48
THREE
Lucky Penny
Hedgehog 53
Notes for the Heartbeat at My Feet 54
Birth Geographic 55
Under the Pascal Moon 60
Toy Universe 61
The Light I Collect 62
Lobison Song 64
Come Home, Come Home 65
Memorial Day Derecho 66
Eclipse 67
Waiting for Him to Speak 68
The Sick Diet 70
Two Egg, Florida 71
Inside the Happiness Factory 72
The Latch 73
Rain: A Catalog 74
Lucky Penny 75
Acknowledgments 78