Asylum

by Quan Barry

Winner of the 2000 Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize2002 finalist in poetry, Society of Midland AuthorsQuan Barry’s stunning debut collection has been compared to Sylvia Plath’s Ariel for the startling complexity of craft and the original sophisticated vision behind it. In these poems beauty is just as likely to be discovered on a radioactive atoll as in the existential questions raised by The Matrix.Asylum  is a work concerned with giving voice to the displaced—both real and fictional. In "some refrains Sam would have played had he been asked" the piano player from Casablanca  is fleshed out in ways the film didn’t allow. Steven Seagal, Yukio Mishima, Tituba of the Salem Witch Trials, and eighteenth-century black poet Phillis Wheatley also populate these poems.Barry engages with the world—the Tuskegee syphilis experiments, the legacy of the Vietnam war—but also tackles the broad meditative question of the individual’s existence in relation to a higher truth, whether examining rituals or questioning, "Where is it written that we should want to be saved?" Ultimately, Asylum finds a haven by not looking away.

Genres: Poetry

90 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 1, 2001

About the author

Born in Saigon and raised on Boston’s north shore, Quan Barry is a professor of English at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and the author of four poetry books; her third book, Water Puppets, won the AWP Donald Hall Prize for Poetry and was a PEN/Open Book finalist. She has received NEA Fellowships in both fiction and poetry, and her work has appeared in such publications as Ms. and The New Yorker. Barry lives in Wisconsin.

Reviews

[Molly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Think of the places women dilate. (4)

gripping the earth's black pillow (7)

I have come to realize the body is its own pyre (13)

the sieves of lungs like two cones (15)

out of the forest with its / trophy of hair (25)

sails wimpled in idolatous wind (26)

from seats rowed like lettuce (46)

slit me open / like a letter addressed / just to him (50)

human cargo / Inpacted like teeth (55)

Because I am fascinated by her bracelets strung with baby teeth, / I will remember her as the woman / who grins with her wrists (56)

[Crystal M · Rating 3 out of 5]

To be fair, the poems ARE good. But overall, the collection is too dark and academic for me. I like poems that are a bit more accessible, but if you like poems that are a bit more dense, then I think you’d like this collection

[Abigail J · Rating 5 out of 5]

Raw and real. These poems conjure up very haunting, thought-provoking images.

[Gina · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

I finished this a few days ago, but I guess my review never posted. I forgot what I wrote
then, but it was something that suggested that YOU also need to read this. ;)

[stephanie roberts · Rating 5 out of 5]

Because every story has two endings, I see your body
breaking down, I see you soaring in the light. Be taken with me.
Come pouring down unified.

[Kent · Rating 5 out of 5]

A moving book, I am fascinated with the artful way Barry tells her story. It is tragic, in no way do I doubt the tragedy driving her to tell this story. But what Barry does that is so pleasing is that she respects me as a reader. She expects me to understand when she talks about, say, syphilis, she is talking about its insidious character, and its constant reminder of sex, and the encounter that might have caused it.

[Siyuan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Barry writes the kind of tied-together, cerebral poetry i deeply admire, but couldn't really aspire to.

[Josette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gorgeous poetry. I read this collection in grad school and it still holds up and resonates after reading so many others.

[R. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quan Barry talks really fast in real life. Her book expects you to be intelligent.