Edificio Sayonara

by John Yau

Poetry from a major observer on the Asian-American experience and much more in life and on this earth.
Memory’s branch quivers / beneath the weight of a butterfly
How am I to know what it wants / without asking
Could it be that simple, the question / and then answer…
Inclues the sequence “Odes,” “Big Island Notebook,” “Genghis Private Eye,” “Postcards from Trakl,” and “Angel Atropado.”

Genres: Poetry

210 pages, Paperback

First published October 28, 1992

About the author

John Yau is an American poet and critic who lives in New York City. He received his B.A. from Bard College in 1972 and his M.F.A. from Brooklyn College in 1978. He has published over 50 books of poetry, artists' books, fiction, and art criticism.

Reviews

[Annelie · Rating 4 out of 5]

stunning, haunting. yau creates the most beautiful poems by writing things that barely make sense and other things that don’t make sense at all

[Shannon · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book messed with my mind. Majorly messed with my mind. It is sick and dark and it gets me in the darkest place. It's technically prose, but you have to read it like a novel for it to make sense. I've read this over and over and over and I still don't have it all figured out.

[Julia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my favorite book of poetry, I think. John Yau is my hero.

[Julian]

The question is whether to write a ton and find a publisher to print it all, or to write a ton and filter it down to one book every 8 years. Yau opts for choice #1. So, as I rate Edificio Sayonara, I rate them all.


He's an amazing poet. Not all of his poems are amazing. He is at once completely stale, invigorating, absurd, and exceedingly intelligent. His music is both classically trained and flat beyond belief, like Wayne Shorter playing a series of basic scales. Ie., more based on toying with theory than christening a new sound. His ideologies are much the same, and are thus kind of brilliant, if not exactly listener friendly.

[M.moore · Rating 4 out of 5]

This isn't the book I read, but it is the closest one to the book I read. John Yau writes great short-stories and he was published by Black Sparrow Press, so when I saw and felt and smelled their familiar cover I decided to check it out from the Boston Public Library. I read the whole book on the way home from work. Goodreads doesn't have his short-story book and I don't remember the name of it, but I thought I'd give him some props because noone seems to no him.