One
The eyes of Salammbô have fallen.
Amid all the absurdity
the conquistador kisses my hand
E of empire
cleaves open my heart.
Shrieks of war
war
war, war.
Vice-royal-ties
Julia Wong Kcomt
Translated by Jennifer Shyue
December 2021
lucid, lactic, slyly sensuous invitations into hypervigilance
Brandon Shimoda
The title of Bi-rey-nato, Julia Wong Kcomt’s sixth poetry collection, is a homonym for “virreinato” or “viceroyalty,” but can also be broken down into its component words: “bi” (bi/two), “rey” (king), and “nato” (born). Likewise, the poems in this chapbook play with binaries: in power, love, language, country, identity. The salt in the air of seaside Lima, the setting of the first section, condenses into the salt that trails through the second section, set mostly in Argentina.
About the Author
Julia Wong Kcomt was born into a tusán (Chinese Peruvian) family in Chepén, Peru, in 1965. She traveled from an early age, and her perceptions of country borders, different cultures, and diversity in ethnicity and religion became a strong motivation to write. She is the author of 17 volumes of poetry, including Un salmón ciego (Borrador Editores) and 18 poemas de fake love para Keanu Reeves (Cascada de Palabras); five books of fiction; and two collections of hybrid prose. She currently lives between Lima and Lisbon.
Praise
Julia Wong Kcomt’s poems are taut and pulsing, each word as incisive as evocative. Jennifer Shyue’s keen ear in translating these poems makes us feel Wong Kcomt breathing along the lines.
Aron Aji
Julia Wong Kcomt's poems sweep you into the tender points of the diasporic soul—that ache of always being a little bit elsewhere, the yearning for homes and languages that might have been. Her decadent bravado and impish humor flit between Chinese and Japanese Peruvians, Brazilian and Argentine poetry, visions of Macau, Baudelaire, and the conquistadors who linger across Latin America. Jennifer Shyue's translation undulates with a delicate, playful attunement. I can't wait to read more.
Katrina Dodson, translator of The Complete Stories by Clarice Lispector
I feel so refreshed reading Julia Wong Kcomt’s poems/Jennifer Shyue’s translations, like a lifetime of rain has lifted and I’ve been given a new prescription. And yet the feeling is not entirely free of a little foreboding, as the poems—lucid, lactic, slyly sensuous invitations into hypervigilance (attention in the face of a shapeshifting power)—are practically animistic, shading everything, making everything glow. Now I want to read everything Wong Kcomt has written (is writing) and everything Shyue is bringing, so ingeniously, into English.
Brandon Shimoda
About the Translator
Jennifer Shyue is a translator focusing on contemporary Cuban and Asian-Peruvian writers. Her work has been supported by grants from Fulbright, Princeton University, and the University of Iowa and has appeared in The Arkansas International, New England Review, Spoon River Poetry Review, and elsewhere. She can be found at shyue.co.
In the News
Links
“The Red Rooster” by Julia Wong Kcomt in Words Without Borders
Julia Wong Kcomt reading at “No Ocean Between Us”
Profile of Julia Wong Kcomt in Perú21
“A Slice of Writing by Nikkei and Tusán Peruvian Writers” by Jennifer Shyue
Two poems by Julia Wong Kcomt in The Margins
Publication Details
ISBN: 978-1-946433-85-5
Chapbook
Saddle-stitched. 48 pp, 5.25 x 8.25 in
Publication Date: December 01 2021
Distribution: Asterism Books (US)
Series: Señal #15