Ocean  Vuong

Winner of the 2017 T. S. Eliot Prize Winner of the 2017 Felix Dennis Prize for Best First Collection A Guardian / Daily Telegraph Book of the Year PBS Summer Recommendation An extraordinary debut from a young Vietnamese American, Night Sky with Exit Wounds is a book of poetry unlike any other. Steeped in war and cultural upheaval and wielding a fresh new language, Vuong writes about the most profound subjects – love and loss, conflict, grief, memory and desire – and attends to them all with lines that feel newly-minted, graceful in their cadences, passionate and hungry in their tender, close attention: ‘...the chief of police/facedown in a pool of Coca-Cola./A palm-sized photo of his father soaking/beside his left ear.’ This is an unusual, important book: both gentle and visceral, vulnerable and assured, and its blend of humanity and power make it one of the best first collections of poetry to come out of America in years. ‘These are poems of exquisite beauty, unashamed of romance, and undaunted by looking directly into the horrors of war, the silences of history. One of the most important debut collections for a generation.’ Andrew McMillan

Night Sky with Exit Wounds

A haunting debut that is simultaneously dreamlike and visceral, vulnerable and redemptive, and risks the painful rewards of emotional honesty.

"Use it to prove how the stars were always what we knew they were: the exit wounds of every misfired word."

"There is so much I need to tell you—but I only earned one life."

"Then, as if breathing, the sea swelled beneath us. If you must know anything, know that the hardest task is to live only once."

"Sometimes I ask for too much just to feel my mouth overflow"

ARCHIVE.

Even sweetness can scratch the throat, so stir the sugar well. —Grandma.

Know that I never chose which way the seasons turned. That it was always October in my throat & you: every leaf refusing to rust.

The stars are not hereditary. —Emily Dickinson.

Maybe we pray on our knees because god only listens when we’re this close to the devil.

… the night is also a grave we climb out of …

I'm reaching across the trunk for a shard of your memory.

um. depression's eating away at me lately & the way this hit me so hard.

If you must know anything, know that the hardest task is to live only once.

gabi <3

the night is also a grave we climb out of 

Best. One. Yet. Still with Vuong's identity soaked into every punctuation mark. Bener-bener one of the best poetry collections I've read this year. I genuinely LOVE how Vuong knows how to infuse bits of his life, his identity, and his home into his writing. After reading two of Ocean Vuong's works, every phrase, comma, and blank space feels a bit more familiar, and I always, ALWAYS slip a smile (or sob) whenever I recognize a reference; still Lan, still Saigon, still Ocean Vuong.

Rune

"& so what—if my feathers

are burning. I

never asked for flight.

Only to feel

this fully, this

entire, the way snow

touches bare skin—& is,

suddenly, snow

no longer."

Best. One. Yet. Still with Vuong's identity soaked into every punctuation mark. Bener-bener one of the best poetry collections I've read this year. I genuinely LOVE how Vuong knows how to infuse bits of his life, his identity, and his home into his writing. After reading two of Ocean Vuong's works, every phrase, comma, and blank space feels a bit more familiar, and I always, ALWAYS slip a smile (or sob) whenever I recognize a reference; still Lan, still Saigon, still Ocean Vuong.



the writing is delicate and hard-hitting at the same time. I was struck by his references to colour (“Red is only black remembering” -Daily Bread) and ability to talk about War Family Love, in ways that are so intimate.

“Gravity breaking/our kneecaps just to show us/the sky” -Eurydice 

“Men/who carry dreams/over mountains, the dead/on their backs./But only a mother can walk/with the weight of a second beating heart.” - Headfirst 

“Maybe we pray on our knees because god/only listens when we’re this close/to the devil“ -Untitled (Blue, Green, and Brown): oil on canvas: Mark Rothko: 1952

Xiang

Ocean,,,,,ily 

the writing is delicate and hard-hitting at the same time. I was struck by his references to colour (“Red is only black remembering” -Daily Bread) and ability to talk about War Family Love, in ways that are so intimate.

Some favourite lines: 

“Gravity breaking/our kneecaps just to show us/the sky” -Eurydice 

“Men/who carry dreams/over mountains, the dead/on their backs./But only a mother can walk/with the weight of a second beating heart.” - Headfirst 

“Maybe we pray on our knees because god/only listens when we’re this close/to the devil“ -Untitled (Blue, Green, and Brown): oil on canvas: Mark Rothko: 1952



Colton Ray

Unlike many other young poets, Vuong's poems speak with the voice and wisdom of someone far older.

envee

updated (2023):
let this be a lesson to read books MULTIPLE times.



first read (2022):
*sighs in disappointment*
yeah, really not a fan of ppl taking prose and just stuffing it with random enjambments to call it poetry.
"on earth we're briefly gorgeous" was prob. the best book i've read so far this year, thus my disappointment with this one. it just wasn't for me. (tbh the 'poem' dedicated to masturbation was very creative - sadly it didn't save my overall review of this book)

𓆨

"There’s enough light to drown in
but never enough to enter the bones."

sputnik sweetheart

My absolute favorite of his works yet. Pieces I am deeply in shambles for: Immigrant Haibun, Headfirst, Self-Portrait as Exit Wounds, Untitled (Blue, Green, and Brown): oil on canvas: Mark Rothko: 1952, Notebook Fragments.

anita

me gustó muchísimo, quise empezar a leer poesía otra vez y la verdad no pude haber escogido mejor libro para esa tarea :3

Amena Elkayal

AND LET ME TELL YOU HOW LYRICAL AND BEAUTIFUL THIS IS!!

Ocean Vuong is a powerhouse for evocative and heartbreaking writing. I read this in 2 parts so I can digest it and I plan to come back to certain highlighted poems in the future, an instant buy for me and I will happily read his grocery list. 

jaz ☁️

Winner of the 2017 Felix Dennis Prize for Best First Collection An extraordinary debut from a young Vietnamese American, Night Sky with Exit Wounds is a book of poetry unlike any other. Steeped in war and cultural upheaval and wielding a fresh new language, Vuong writes about the most profound subjects - love and loss, conflict, grief, memory and desire - and attends to them all with lines that feel newly-minted, graceful in their cadences, passionate and hungry in their tender, close attention: '...the chief of police/facedown in a pool of Coca-Cola./A palm-sized photo of his father soaking/beside his left ear.' This is an unusual, important book: both gentle and visceral, vulnerable and assured, and its blend of humanity and power make it one of the best first collections of poetry to come out of America in years. 'These are poems of exquisite beauty, unashamed of romance, and undaunted by looking directly into the horrors of war, the silences of history. One of the most important debut collections for a generation.' Andrew McMillan

Isabella

started reading this more than a year ago and only got around to finishing it this week. honestly glad that i took time to savor this book and revisit it instead of finishing it in one sitting.

ocean vuong has such a way with words! his poems are imbued with just a little bit of magic and it just makes u FEEL things... kinda like a ghibli film but not rly... basta mwah chef's kiss

charisa

The most beautiful part of your body
is where it’s headed. & remember,
loneliness is still time spent
with the world.  

raw, careening, unflinchingly honest. pain at so many levels: in war, in love, in incomplete histories, in growing up.

eve 

i can finally add this treasure to my read books. i started this poem collection at the beginning of February and it took me a long time to read it, because I analyzed every poem in this and wrote annotations for them. my partner likes poetry, they are trying to get into it and I just can’t bear all that rupi kaur stuff. so I went and looked a bit and found this gem. Ocean Vuong is an excellent poet. I did hear about his book, On earth we are briefly gorgeous, and after snooping I found out he has a poetry collection and a heart wrenching life story. 
This is a short book but don’t be fooled because it is very hard and if you want to understand every meaning in the poems (I advise you would do that) you need to pay attention to every little part. Every verse, every phrase, the feelings, colors, ampersands, semicolons..
Exquisite. Raw feelings. I related to the poems very much, from the love of a mother to abuse of a father. And if I didn’t, I learned about it.
I am so glad I picked this book up and decided to study Ocean’s words. The thing is that only reading a single poem out loud makes you feel like music, makes you feel so
many emotions, without even understanding the meaning.
Oceans’s family history, his own history, his love and hate for his sexuality and his body and his ethnicity. It was so strong and vulnerable.
Ocean Vuong’s poems, they not only use their rhythm and metaphors, they bring you to a whole realm of magic. 

—
My mother said I could be anything I wanted - but I chose to live.
—
..they were: the exit wounds of every 
misfired word.
—
&

enya

“Use it to prove how the stars were always what we knew they were: the exit wounds of every misfired word.”

ocean vuong i will love you forever

Maria

I found it easier to connect with Ocean Vuong's prose in his poems rather than his novel. It took a bit for me to get used to his style but now I'm a fan! He has a mesmerizing way to pull you into very delicate yet powerful moments. He writes from the scars of his life and brings alive a sense of melancholy, loss, and brokenness. Themes in this collection are family, traumas, (queer) coming-of-age, the body, broken loves, and the intersectionality of these.

The pieces I liked were:
* Threshold
* Head First
* Into the Breach
* On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous (second favorite)
* Notebook Fragments
* Logophobia
* Someday I'll Love Ocean Vuong (my favorite)
* Devotion

brianna

what i would give to spend a day in ocean vuong’s brain

beautiful, heartbreaking, lyrical. i'm not the biggest fan of 90% of the structural decisions for this book. it had me straining my eyes way too much as i read this on my phone & the chosen structure was altered that much more in ebook form. had this been a less beautiful piece of work i genuinely would have added it to the dnf just because it was so difficult for me to read structurally.

Ivy X

Poetry, 3.5
Quotes: 
- If you must know anything, know that you were born because no one else was coming. 

-Men who carry dreams over mountains, the dead on their backs. 

-When our lips touched the day closed 
into a coffin. In the museum of the heart
 there are two headless people building a burning house. 

-Always another hour to kill--only to beg some god to give it back. 

-How/ does anyone stop / regret / without cutting/ off his hands? 

-If you are given anything 
be sure to leave
no tracks in the snow.

-Turn back & find the book I left for us, filled with all the colors of the sky 
forgotten by gravediggers. 
Use it. 
Use it to prove how the stars 
were always what we knew 
they were: the exit wounds
of every 
misfired word. 

-4:37 am. How come depression makes me feel more alive? 
Life is funny. 

-& remember, loneliness is still time spent 
with the world. Here's the room with everyone in it.

brilliant! though i don't often read poetry, vuong's style of writing is absolutely beautiful and almost tragic - i love it. seemingly simple but there are so many layers to his writing <3 lovely, i'm always in awe.

the themes that r present in his writing hits very close to home, so i cherish ocean and his books very much. my favourite from this book has to be trojan! the imagery.....omfg... a must read! 

kyli ^^

brilliant! though i don't often read poetry, vuong's style of writing is absolutely beautiful and almost tragic - i love it. seemingly simple but there are so many layers to his writing <3 lovely, i'm always in awe.

the themes that r present in his writing hits very close to home, so i cherish ocean and his books very much. my favourite from this book has to be trojan! the imagery.....omfg... a must read! 



Fran Gutiérrez

3.5
I really liked the last poems the most

tina

3.5 stars

idk what compelled me to read this book when i don’t even like poetry but ocean vuong’s writing is undeniably beautiful so this was still a good read.

heather

Excerpt from Notebook Fragments:

"I dreamed I walked barefoot all the way to your house in the snow. Everything was the blue of smudged ink

and you were still alive. There was even a light the shade of sunrise inside
your window.

God must be a season, grandma said, looking out at the blizzard drowning her garden.

My footsteps on the sidewalk were the smallest flights.

Dear god, if you are a season, let it be the one I passed through to get here.

Here. That's all I wanted to be.

I promise."

Night Sky with Exit Wounds

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