VUONG, Ocean
Time is a Mother

It’s been a long time since my body.
Unbearable, I put it down
on the earth the way my old man
rolled dice. It’s been a long time since
time. But I had weight back there [...]

In this deeply intimate second poetry collection, Ocean Vuong searches for life among the aftershocks of his mother's death, embodying the paradox of sitting within grief while being determined to survive beyond it. Shifting through memory, and in concert with the themes of his novel On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, Vuong contends with personal loss, the meaning of family, and the value of joy in a perennially fractured American spirit. Vivid, brave, and propulsive, Vuong's poems circle fragmented lives to find both restoration as well as the epicentre of the break. [publishers’ note]

> Now in paperback <

Published by Jonathan Cape / Penguin, 2022
Poetry