A review by nineinchnails
Time Is a Mother by Ocean Vuong

emotional reflective sad medium-paced

3.5

i don't usually read poetry so i think a lot of these went over my head. i didn't really connect to or understand much of the poems in the first half of this collection which was a little disappointing because i've heard such good things about vuong's work. there were more than a few poems in the second half that managed to grip me though. 

'Künstlerroman' was my favourite here. if i'm remembering correctly it was the longest poem, which might be why i managed to connect to it more. it was gutting and felt very raw. a shorter poem i really enjoyed was 'Amazon History of a Former Nail Salon Worker'. i don't think i've ever had a list poem make me tear up like that. vuong is no doubt a talented poet but i think the formatting and structure of most of these poems just didn't work for me - that's not to say that they'll never work for me, but as it stands i don't read much poetry so i much preferred the longer poems in this collection.
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