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Open-Heart Surgery
Both a collection of poetry and a journal, Open-Heart Surgery invites the reader to explore their creativity, while touching on themes such as loss, feminism, and love. Written by Johanna Leo and illustrated by Michelle Gómez, this book is an open invitation to sit down with your darkest parts and see them as they are. To pull lessons out of them, to alchemize them into art, and then let them go. Open-Heart Surgery is a deep dive into every corner of the heart, and an invitation to welcome anything it might the good, the bad, and the ugly. I lay on the surgical table, perform open-heart surgery on myself. These pieces are ugly. They're red and raw and grimy, dripping in all of their gore, in all of their tainted glory.
- GenresPoetry
121 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 10, 2020
10 people want to read
About the author
Johanna Leo
1 book22 followersJohanna Leo is a Mexican writer based in Mexico City. Through her poetry, she explores themes such as grief, womanhood, love, trauma, and heartbreak. She is the 2023 Māhealani Dudoit Writer-in-Residence for Hawai'i Review and her work has been published in The Oakland Arts Review, Collision Literary Magazine, Merion West, and others. When not writing, she is most likely baking or spending time outdoors.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
September 21, 2020
Open-Heart Surgery is a collection of poetry weaved together with heart, soul, and aching. I honestly finished this book in less than two hours being as I could just not put it down at all. I loved it. You can tell as you go through each and each poem that Johanna really laid her heart out in the line, like the title says so itself. She exposes parts of herself, the grief, the mess, the heartbreak, but she tenderly turns it all into a poetic mosaic of beautiful words. This is a poetry book that opens the readers heart to examine themselves as well, it makes feelings that we have inside us feel as though they're being seen. It speaks to them and lets them know that it is okay to be soft, but also okay to grieve for what we have lost. It's a reflection of beauty, ugly, hurt, and love. I loved it so, so much. I can't wait and hope Johanna comes out with more books in the future! She's definitely a poet to keep your eye on!
August 25, 2020
What struck me most about this collection of poetry was how raw it is. Johanna Leo has an incredible way of immersing her audience in her own, unfiltered emotions. She feels something, she writes about it, we feel it too. This book is a perfect example.
I greatly admire the amount of both vulnerability and relatability that this project contains. The writing, the drawings, and especially the prompts at the end. The book feels less like a book and more like an experience that you're sucked into.
To summarize: Open Heart Surgery is a physical representation of pure creativity. If you like art that makes your heart bleed, your eyes well up, and your perspective on both ugly and beautiful things change, this is for you.
I greatly admire the amount of both vulnerability and relatability that this project contains. The writing, the drawings, and especially the prompts at the end. The book feels less like a book and more like an experience that you're sucked into.
To summarize: Open Heart Surgery is a physical representation of pure creativity. If you like art that makes your heart bleed, your eyes well up, and your perspective on both ugly and beautiful things change, this is for you.
December 28, 2020
It’s been a while since I’ve read something that really got me strong feelings about it, but Johanna Leo got me in her work completely, this isn’t just a poetry book, that you read because maybe the cover page was pretty or because someone suggest you to read it, this is the kind of book that you start reading and you really can't get rid of the feelings it gets you to.
For me it’s a book that show us that poetry is more alive than ever and that writers as Johanna are in someplace of the world making true art through words. I really read it in less than an hour, and it was one of the best books I was able to read this year, we’re really lucky because in my opinion here we’ve the first steps of one of the most promising writers of our generation.
For me it’s a book that show us that poetry is more alive than ever and that writers as Johanna are in someplace of the world making true art through words. I really read it in less than an hour, and it was one of the best books I was able to read this year, we’re really lucky because in my opinion here we’ve the first steps of one of the most promising writers of our generation.
July 26, 2020
This is an amazingly powerful piece. The poems are deeply introspective and are written on a range of personal topics regarding relationships and grief which are simultaneously personal and relatable. The book also includes a fun interactive section in the back to inspire potential future poets to delve into their own imaginations and to create.
October 3, 2024
I must say, it's not the kind of reading I usually go for, but damn, i really enjoyed the poems: The Anatomy of Moving On, Lawless Land, and If My Body Could Speak. However, Nostalgia and A Retelling of Grief really resonated with me. A great piece of work, I'm excited to see what comes next in your carrer.
December 21, 2020
Open-heart surgery is a poetry collection I cannot wait to read over and over again. Johanna Leo has created a work that is as elegant as it is poignant, a quick read that stays in your head for days after you put it down.
Though born in Mexico, Leo has decided to write her debut poetry collection in English after spending her first two years of college in the US. Surprisingly, this choice makes for an equally enriching experience, her poetic inquiry more about herself than about the language she chooses to use. She is comfortable writing in English and it shows: she molds each verse to fit her hands, they respond to her just as easily.
Her verse could come across as semantically simple, but each line is charged with meaning—love, pain, and despair fill each of the poems. They all have the potential to deeply move each reader, not because it’s relatable, but due to its unapologetic nakedness. The author does not shy away from sensitive topics: she provides trigger warnings for the poems that deal with eating disorders, sexual assault, and suicide. This representation of Western youth in the 21st century alone makes it worth the read, but its authenticity is what kept me coming back to it.
The book is also part journal, the prompts approachable and genuine. Leo pours out her feelings onto paper throughout the book, it’s only fitting that it ends by us performing open-heart surgery on ourselves. The pieces may be raw, but we see them dripping “in all of their tainted / glory”.
A kaleidoscope of emotions, the collection is teenage angst and the acceptance only young adulthood can bring. As readers, we bear witness to the coming-of-age of this young Mexican poet.
Though born in Mexico, Leo has decided to write her debut poetry collection in English after spending her first two years of college in the US. Surprisingly, this choice makes for an equally enriching experience, her poetic inquiry more about herself than about the language she chooses to use. She is comfortable writing in English and it shows: she molds each verse to fit her hands, they respond to her just as easily.
Her verse could come across as semantically simple, but each line is charged with meaning—love, pain, and despair fill each of the poems. They all have the potential to deeply move each reader, not because it’s relatable, but due to its unapologetic nakedness. The author does not shy away from sensitive topics: she provides trigger warnings for the poems that deal with eating disorders, sexual assault, and suicide. This representation of Western youth in the 21st century alone makes it worth the read, but its authenticity is what kept me coming back to it.
The book is also part journal, the prompts approachable and genuine. Leo pours out her feelings onto paper throughout the book, it’s only fitting that it ends by us performing open-heart surgery on ourselves. The pieces may be raw, but we see them dripping “in all of their tainted / glory”.
A kaleidoscope of emotions, the collection is teenage angst and the acceptance only young adulthood can bring. As readers, we bear witness to the coming-of-age of this young Mexican poet.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews