title: KILIG: a silver romance in verse
publisher: red wolf editions
realeas date: august 22, 2026
note: this is the author's fifth book published since feb 2026. as of today, yuan has published 19 poetry colletions/chapbooks.
review by the publisher:
This poetry collection by Yuan Changming has been dubbed by the author as “a silver romance in verse” and the title itself “Kilig” is a Tagalog word meaning a sudden giddy, heart-fluttering rush of romantic excitement or joy (if you know you know). Such be the phase the heart does not move past. The lovers are apart–separated by the Pacific and the ensuing years of separation—but connected. Their love is sustained by language.
my poems keep
Bleeding in my heart, where the beauty
Of love is rich, though never full & fleshy
Or round like a fruit, like a distant star
–“Wabi-Sabi”
In this aspect Yuan’s poems are captivating and whimsical. Filled with poetic longing, where love is being put on a pedestal. It is founded on so much palpable intensity and delight! Distance does not detract from such a coupling. The poems are a recollection of a sense of the sublime, a frieze of two souls richly bound together, even if not together. Yuan’s poems celebrate the experience of the blooms of an early love, held onto in a later stage of life.
Nothing
happens, save my thought of you—
ready to bloom into a morning glow,
as redundant evidence.
–“February Cherry Blossoms”
No comments:
Post a Comment