You can use your Boston Public Library card to borrow titles from these partner libraries:
0 of 1 copy available
Wait time: Not available
From National Poetry Series winner Su Cho, chosen by Paige Lewis, a debut poetry collection about immigration, memory, and a family’s lexicon
Language and lore are at the core of The Symmetry of Fish, a moving debut about coming-of-age in the middle of nowhere. With striking and tender insight, it seeks to give voice to those who have been denied their stories, and examines the way phrases and narratives are passed down through immigrant families—not diluted over time, but distilled into potency over generations. In this way, a family's language is not lost but continuously remade, hitched to new associations, and capable of blooming anew, with the power to cut across space and time to unearth buried memories. The poems in The Symmetry of Fish insist that language is first and foremost a bodily act; even if our minds can't recall a word or a definition, if we trust our mouths, expression will find us—though never quite in the forms we expect.
-
Creators
-
Series
-
Publisher
-
Release date
October 11, 2022 -
Formats
-
OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9780593613221
- File size: 29565 KB
- Duration: 01:01:35
-
-
Languages
- English
-
Reviews
-
November 28, 2022
The vivid, folkloric debut from Cho recounts her experience growing up in a Korean immigrant family in Indiana. Advice from her mother is stamped with striking imagery, as in the opening lines of the title poem: “The head of the fish thuds/ into the kitchen sink// with a splash of lettuced water./ She says, Not this. Don’t// marry the head or anyone/ too cunning.” In “Hello, My Parents Don’t Speak English Well, How Can I Help You,” Cho captures the complexity of being an immigrant child, feeling both ashamed and angry about that shame: “Once I called her stupid for/ Packing my field trip lunch with/ Quick sesame rice balls even though that’s what I/ Requested.... The truth is, I hated my friends/ Upset over the sesame smell.” The lessons and culinary efforts of women—mothers, grandmothers, ancestors—is a running theme, taking on a surreal tone in “A Little Cheonyeo Gwishin Appears in My Kitchen,” in which Cho cooks with a chaotic spirit from Korean lore: “She opens/ the tofu, smashes/ the watery curd with her/ foot, and soaks// a package of dried kelp/ in the trash.” Infused with bittersweet nostalgia, Cho’s arresting work captures the full emotional spectrum in poems that are sometimes charming, sometimes haunting, but always memorable. -
It's easy to imagine being at an in-person reading while listening to Su Cho narrate these lyrical poems. There's a rhythmic intensity to her performance that gives her work a sense of urgency and immediacy. In poems that are both playful and formal Cho explores the intersections of language, translation, lineage, immigration, family, and food. The poems centered around food are particularly poignant, as Cho uses stark, beautiful imagery--deboning fish, using chopsticks, slicing vegetables--to illuminate the rituals, histories, and complex emotions that define her own and her family's relationship to food and culture. Her narration is full of deliberate pauses, shifts in volume, and dramatic accents on particular words. But none of this feels contrived; every poem comes alive in Cho's rich, inviting voice. L.S. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine
-