Aimee Nezhukumatathil

World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments

With an encyclopedic range of subjects, Nezukumatathil takes a wide-angle look at our planet, its vulnerabilities, and the human condition.

Oceanic

From beloved, award-winning poet Aimee Nezhukumatathil comes a debut work of nonfiction—a collection of essays about the natural world, and the way its inhabitants can teach, support, and inspire us. As a child, Nezhukumatathil called many places home: the grounds of a Kansas mental institution, where her Filipina mother was a doctor; the open skies and tall mountains of Arizona, where she hiked with her Indian father; and the chillier climes of western New York and Ohio. But no matter where she was transplanted—no matter how awkward the fit or forbidding the landscape—she was able to turn to our world’s fierce and funny creatures for guidance. “What the peacock can do,” she tells us, “is remind you of a home you will run away from and run back to all your life.” The axolotl teaches us to smile, even in the face of unkindness; the touch-me-not plant shows us how to shake off unwanted advances; the narwhal demonstrates how to survive in hostile environments. Even in the strange and the unlovely, Nezhukumatathil finds beauty and kinship. For it is this way with wonder: it requires that we are curious enough to look past the distractions in order to fully appreciate the world’s gifts. Warm, lyrical, and gorgeously illustrated by Fumi Nakamura, World of Wonders is a book of sustenance and joy.

In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments

World of Wonders

Lucky Fish

Nourishments and Jamborees

Bite by Bite

Danni Quintos

Two Brown Dots

The astonishing second book by a lively and inventive American poet of Filipina-Indian descent. Naomi Shihab Nye says of this book, "Aimee Nezhukumatathil's poems are . . . ripe, funny and fresh. They're the fullness of days, deliciously woven of heart and verve, rich with sources and elements-animals, insects, sugar, cardamom, legends, countries, relatives, soaps, fruits-taste and touch. I love the nubby layerings of lines, luscious textures and constructions. . . . She knows that many worlds may live in one house. . . ."

Poems

At the Drive-in Volcano

Poetry. As three worlds collide, a mother's Philippines, a father's India and the poet's contemporary America, the resulting impressions are chronicled in this collection of incisive and penetrating verse. The writer weaves her words carefully into a wise and affecting embroidery that celebrates the senses while remaining down-to-earth and genuine. "We see that everything is in fact miracle fruit, including this book itself"-Andrew Hudgins.

Miracle Fruit

World of Wondwes, In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments

Ross Gay

Lace & Pyrite: Letters from Two Gardens

Lucky Fish travels along a lush current — a confluence of leaping vocabulary and startling formal variety, with upwelling gratitude at its source: for love, motherhood, “new hope,” and the fluid and rich possibilities of words themselves. With an exuberant appetite for “my morning song, my scurry-step, my dew,” anchored in complicated human situations, this astounding young poet’s third collection of poems is her strongest yet. "Nezhukumatathil's third book is fascinated with the small mechanisms of being, whether natural, personal, or imagined. Everything from eating eels in the Ozark mountains to the history of red dye finds a rich life in her poems. At times her lush settings and small stories are reminiscent of fairy tales, while at others Nezhukumatathil speaks with resonance and fierceness. Even as the poems jump from the Philippines to India to New York, they still take their time, stopping to notice that 'there is no mystery on water/ greater than the absence of rust,' and to draw small but wonderful parallels." —Publishers Weekly

La poeta Aimee Nezhukumatathil nos sorprende con una colección de ensayos sobre el mundo natural donde nos revela cómo los animales y las plantas pueden enseñarnos e inspirarnos. De niña, Aimee vivió en distintos lugares: Kansas, Arizona, Nueva York, Ohio... Pero, por mucho que le costara encajar o por muy amenazante que fuese el entorno, tuvo siempre como guías a las criaturas que pueblan el planeta. En este libro de una enorme riqueza, la autora aborda una treintena de seres naturales y nos deja entrever las maravillas y rarezas que nos rodean. El ajolote, por ejemplo, nos enseña a sonreír a pesar del dolor; la nometoques nos ayuda a librarnos de proposiciones indeseadas, mientras que el narval nos muestra que es posible sobrevivir en ambientes hostiles. Incluso en lo extraño y lo desagradable, Aimee encuentra belleza y afinidad. Cargado de poesía y bellamente ilustrado por Fumi Mini Nakamura, Un mundo asombroso es una obra sutil y vertiginosa sobre la diversidad y nuestra capacidad de ver y comprender.

Aimee Nezhukumatathil

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