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Author Chang, Victoria, 1970- author.

Title Obit : poems / Victoria Chang
Published Port Townsend, Washington : Copper Canyon Press, [2020]
©2020

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Description 1 online resource (x, 113 pages)
Contents My father's frontal lobe -- My mother -- Victoria Chang -- Voice mail -- Language -- My children, children -- Each time I write hope -- Language -- Future -- Civility -- My mother's lungs -- Privacy -- My mother's teeth -- I tell my children -- Friendships -- Gait -- Logic -- Optimism -- Ambition -- Chair -- Do you smell my cries? -- I tell my children -- Tears -- Memory -- Language -- Tomas Tranströmer -- Approval -- Sometimes all I have -- You don't need a thing -- Secrets -- Music -- Appetite -- Form -- Optimism -- I can't say with faith -- To love anyone -- Hands -- Oxygen -- Reason -- Home -- Memory -- I am a miner. the light burns blue -- Caretakers -- Subject matter -- Sadness -- Empathy -- Obituary writer -- Do you see the tree? -- Doctors -- Yesterday -- Grief -- Blame -- Time -- Today I show you -- Control -- Situation -- Obsession -- Clock -- Hope -- Head -- Blue dress - Hindsight -- Priest -- I put on a shirt -- Where do they find hope? -- Car -- My mother's favorite potted tree -- Similes -- Affection -- Home -- When a mother dies -- Bees -- Clothes -- Guilt -- Ocean -- Face -- My children say no -- Have you ever looked -- America -- I am ready to
Summary After her mother died, poet Victoria Chang refused to write elegies. Rather, she distilled her grief during a feverish two weeks by writing scores of poetic obituaries for all she lost in the world. In this book, she writes of "the way memory gets up after someone has died and starts walking." These poems reinvent the form of newspaper obituary to both name what has died ("civility," "language," "the future," "Mother's blue dress") and the cultural impact of death on the living. Whereas elegy attempts to immortalize the dead, an obituary expresses loss, and the love for the dead becomes a conduit for self-expression. In this unflinching and lyrical book, the poet meets her grief and creates a powerful testament for the living. -- Provided by publisher
Notes "Lannan literary selection."
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 107, 108-110)
Notes Print version record
Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, 2021 Poetry
Subject Obituaries -- Poetry
Grief -- Poetry
Parent and adult child -- Poetry
Parents -- Death -- Poetry
POETRY -- American -- Asian American.
Parents -- Death
Parent and adult child
Grief
Obituaries
Genre/Form poetry.
Poetry
Poetry.
Poésie.
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9781619322189
1619322188