Two decades of crafting poems; my drawer of words is crowded. Every time I open it, dragonflies escape. While many poems have been published in various literary journals, until recently, I’ve avoided diverting efforts from writing towards preparing manuscripts. However, priorities have shifted, and I’m happy to announce that exciting progress has been made with a series of collected works:

The following books are completed and have been submitted to publishers:

• Second Tongue – a collection of persona poems written in traditional verse and free verse, weaved around the kitchen stories of immigrant women.
  
• Songs of Con Sáo – a book of confessional, biographical poems, free verse and lyrical, these poems examine the topic of Vietnamese diaspora, a poetic companion to my novel, Little Sister Left Behind.
  
• Sunday Bathers – a collection of poems about love but not necessary a collection of love poems, written in both traditional verse and free verse. I started this one in grad school but wasn’t able to strike the right note until now.

More recent works still in progress:

• Life without Photographs – a book of narrative prose poems. Though the voices and narratives are diverse, somehow they add up to memories from one life… a life without receipts, without photographs. In its last round of edits, this book will be ready for submission this year.
  
• A Thousand Breaths – a collection of 1000 haikus, written but is still being molded and organized. I hope to have this book edited and ready to be sent out next year.
  
• Of Salt and Bones – a book of what I call “found poems,” which are micro-poems written as spontaneous reactions to the artwork on the pages they occupy. The artwork for this book was created around the motif of scavenged beach objects. I’m still searching for a press that would be interested in this type of book.

My current project:

• Mooncake Girl – intended to be a hybrid memoir, including prose, poems, essays and artwork, but I’ve already started to create myths instead of just recording history, so this will likely turn into a novel.

This list consists of years of silent work. Those who work this way don’t mind the solitude; we’re grateful for it. It’s the kind of work that occupies a lifetime of hours and rewards the worker with discoveries and wonder.

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© Samantha Lê. All rights reserved.