Asian American Poet: Suji Kwock Kim

To concur with my classmate, I too found myself talking along time to decide which Asian American Poet to choose from. But after deciding, the Asian American poet of choice for me was Suji Kwock Kim.

Suji Kwock Kim is a Korean American poet and playwright born in 1969, she earned her education in Yale and has has ever 22 reprints on her work done in several languages including, Korean, Japanese, Russian, Spanish, Italian, German, Arabic, and Bengali.

The poem I have decided to write about is:

Fugue for Eye and Vanishing Point

Give me the clarity, the sharpness
of a season when things are plainly
themselves. No smear of dreaming on the dirt.
Let my eye see without seeking more
than what's there, and find what is
is sweet. Bleach-fumes. Urine. Cement.
Bus-exhaust. Oil glittering on pistons.
Soiled needles wrapped in butcher paper.
Infinite engine trapped in skin.

Like All Poetry I had to read and read and read to be able to paint a picture, an image that would be painted so bright and clear that the poets intangible thought would become mine. And as I read the poem, I began to draw the following parallel (or I think it was).

In the poem the poet write about how she wished she can see the world in clearly and visibly, without putting thought stressing the "infinite engine trapped in skin", literally the mind or imagination. when one looks at concrete, urine or the stench of bleach... it is what it is. but love, emotion, and all those things in life that are unexplainable.

With souch a limited number of Asian American Poets it is important to understand the cultural loss others don't encounter. each poet and culture is different and fision between the two creates a third. A third we should all be exposed to.

-Rafael De La Torre