Ocean Vuong’s first full-length collection aims straight for the perennial “big”—and very human—subjects of romance, family, memory, grief, war, and melancholia. None of these he allows to overwhelm his spirit or his poems, which demonstrate, through breath and cadence and unrepentant enthrallment, that a gentle palm on a chest can calm the fiercest hungers.
My favorite poems from this collection are: “Seventh Circle of Earth”, “Aubade with Burning City”, “Notebook Fragments”, “Someday I’ll Love Ocean Vuong”, “The Smallest Measure”, and “To My Father / To My Future Son”.