i cut my tongueteems with contrast rebellious energies of electric flights crash into questions about forgiveness and repair Kyo Lee presents readers with a bewitchingly noir portrait burning with imagery of drowned cities archetypal families lovers teeth rabbits snakes Korean mosquitos and holy water Lees romantic hungering speakers are often surprised by their own liminality i forgot the weight of my own spine in the water as memories interrupt with the force of their own pulsing agendas Sun Yung Shin author ofThe Wet HexandUnbearable Splendor

Each poem in this compelling book is a beating heart a prayer an act of rebellion Theres a tender surprise in every line every cutting image In Kyo Lees hands words become anything but ordinary her poems hit the secret bulls eye in our collective psyche Susan Musgrave author ofExculpatory Lilies

Absolutely incandescent Every stanza is a revelation every line a reverberation In Kyo Lees hands language becomes both a banner and blaze An astounding debut from an arresting new voice shot through with rare and dazzling light I wish I could have grown up with this book and I am so glad to live in a world where it exists Gina Chung author ofSea ChangeandGreen Frog

Kyo Lee is an astounding new talent in queer Asian poetry Her debut collection is a glittering assemblage of poems that slices straight to the bone as Lee dissects love grief desire and the space between the world we live in and the world we long for Lees use of language is raw resonant and razor sharp rendering intimate confessional poetry against the backdrop of motifs and themes that evoke the Asian North American diaspora with luminous beauty Readers will leavei cut my tongue on a broken countryas one leaves a dream with Lees evocative magic still trailing in their wake Kai Cheng Thom author ofa place called No Homeland

Formally inventive playful and tender these poems are resoundingly alive Not since Susan Musgrave has such a young poet burst onto the scene fully formed writing heartbreakingly perfect poetry Lee will continue to astound you with her wisdom depth of talent and unflinching eye Sarah Tsiang author ofGrappling Hook

Here is an urgency that blows me open with a kind of bewildering immediate intimacy Kyo Lee somehow reaches into brain and heart and mouth to pull out words her readers wish theyd had the courage to have spoken themselves There is a poetic nimbleness but also the stone of cultural complexity that is perhaps necessary to know what it means to be a queer Korean diasporic subject These poems had they existed before might have changed the course of so much that has and has not been told That these poems exist now shake that foundation to its very corei cut my tonguewill devastate Everything is pulled inside out Jenny Heijun Wills author ofOlder Sister Not Necessarily Related

Exquisite details permeate this debut collection We follow a narrator whose worlds and self are fractured and mending We hear translations gasps and tongue on tender rabbit meat The narrator is both the lifeless rabbit and the killer riding trains through dimensions of memory time and place Leanne Dunic author ofWetandOne and Half of You

i cut my tongue on a broken countryweaves heartbreak sex malice temptation devastation and defiance into a powerful comingofage collection Deftly moving through languages landscapes and time Kyo Lee builds us a lattice to scale as we navigate Orientalism familial expectation loss of religion and emerging queer identity to carve out new lexicons and a redefined sense of love Ellen ChangRichardson author ofBlood Belies