In the book’s titular poem, Wang writes to poet Natalie Lim: “They say, / Go back / to where you are from. The image of falling petals returns in a later poem, “Springtime Ghazals,” where Wang describes how “Time falls in gradients down the hourglass / …The mechanic heartbeat / of a petal falling.” In “Elegy for Winter” she writes, “I want to be the invitation / that conducts inches of the sky’s / infinitesimal flowers to us each year,” likening snowflakes to falling petals with vivid beauty. Throughout the collection, Wang uses images of flowers like plum blossoms and sunflowers to write magical poems that transport the reader into her world.Īlthough the book opens with poems that walk through winter, Wang infuses spring into the cold beginning of the year. The poems span across mother tongues, metaphorical language, and immigrant movement across bodies of water.
In her debut collection Pebble Swing, Isabella Wang writes with remarkable and lyrical skill that echoes the influences of literary forebearers such as Li Bai and Phyllis Webb. Isabella Wang, Pebble Swing (Harbour Publishing, 2021), 112 pp., $18.95.
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