Review: Night Sky with Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong
As is often the case with me and poetry, I didn’t always “get” what certain poems in Night Sky with Exit Wounds (Copper Canyon Press, 2016) were about or trying to say. However, what does resonate, very clearly, are Ocean Vuong’s gorgeous phrases and the larger themes found within Vuong’s work — war, violence, family, love, death.
Whereas Vuong’s highly-acclaimed novel On Earth We are Briefly Gorgeous is written as a letter to his mother, who cannot read, many of these poems seem to focus on Vuong’s father, whom he has shared in interviews he has never met.
Two of the best poems are “Of Thee I Sing,” which is about the assassination of John F. Kennedy from Jackie’s perspective, and “Aubade with Burning City.” The latter is set in South Vietnam, April 29, 1975 when Armed Forces Radio played Irving Berlin’s “White Christmas” as a code to begin Operation Frequent Wind, the ultimate evacuation of American civilians and Vietnamese refugees by helicopter during the fall of Saigon. Vuong intersperses the lyrics of “White Christmas” throughout his poem and the result is hauntingly devastating.
Those who appreciated Vuong’s poetic and evocative language in On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous will find much of the same here.
“Maybe we pray on our knees because god only listens when we’re this close to the devil.” (from “Untitled (Blue, Green, and Brown): oil on canvas: Mark Rothko: 1952)
“You will always remember what you were doing when it hurts the most.” (from “Untitled (Blue, Green, and Brown): oil on canvas: Mark Rothko: 1952)
“& remember, loneliness is still time spent with the world. Here’s the room with everyone in it. Your dead friends passing through you like wind through a wind chime.” (from “Someday I’ll Love Ocean Vuong”)
May is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, and I read this for #asianreadathon.
The post Review: Night Sky with Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong first appeared on melissa firman.
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