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A review by _rusalka
Iep Jāltok: Poems from a Marshallese Daughter by Kathy Jetn̄il-Kijiner
5.0
So it happened. I found a poetry book I cannot stop thinking about. I found a poetry collection that made me stop and find Lexx and make him listen to the poems I had just read. I found poetry that connected.
Not all of this book did it for me. There were certain poems that I just did not have the cultural experience or understanding to connect with. But I appreciated them and their teachings.
But others. Others about colonialism, nuclear testing, racism both from within and outside the Pacific communities, climate change and impacts, health issues within Indigenous communities, internalised racism, politics... they all resonated. And at times resonated with a punch to the gut.
And that is not to say this tiny book is bleak. It is funny and insightful, it just doesn't gloss over the massive impacts that the Marshall Islands (which includes Bikini Atoll for those of us old enough to remember that name. I didn't know that until this book) have experienced over the past 150 years or so.
I have never understood 'modern' poetry before. It can pretty, but why not write prose? But this is a collection that shows why you use poetry as a medium, where a perfect phrase and no other fluff, structured in the simplest way is art with words, and sometime literally is art with words.
I'll be thinking about these poems for a long time.
Not all of this book did it for me. There were certain poems that I just did not have the cultural experience or understanding to connect with. But I appreciated them and their teachings.
But others. Others about colonialism, nuclear testing, racism both from within and outside the Pacific communities, climate change and impacts, health issues within Indigenous communities, internalised racism, politics... they all resonated. And at times resonated with a punch to the gut.
And that is not to say this tiny book is bleak. It is funny and insightful, it just doesn't gloss over the massive impacts that the Marshall Islands (which includes Bikini Atoll for those of us old enough to remember that name. I didn't know that until this book) have experienced over the past 150 years or so.
I have never understood 'modern' poetry before. It can pretty, but why not write prose? But this is a collection that shows why you use poetry as a medium, where a perfect phrase and no other fluff, structured in the simplest way is art with words, and sometime literally is art with words.
I'll be thinking about these poems for a long time.