The Unbearable Heart Poems by Kimiko Hahn Winner of a 1996 American Book Award!! Book Description . About the Author . Excerpt . Reviews . Events . Buy Books Now The novelist and critic John Berger recently observed. "When a person dies, they leave behind...an emptiness...[that] is different for each person mourned.... A likeness is something left behind invisibly." The shape of human absence after death is also Hahn's concern in her fourth book. How do we bear "the unbearable"? And how can loss become narrative? Considering these questions, the poet lives within them, reflecting on the aftermath of a mother's death in a car crash. Located in the phenomenal world, Hahn's gaze is confident and immediate, whether lighting upon a jar of cold cream or a flowering fruit tree. As she searches for a narrative that comforts or echoes what one seeks, she confirms her ongoing interest in narrative fragmentation, including folk and fairy tales, fractured story, dialogue, historical reconstruction, and quotation as her means. Finding no existing narrative enough, she suggests, "'You must use...(magic/courage, foreshortening...) to construct one for yourself/and your children." With rapture and grace, she does. - Poetry Calendar Whether they deal with love, loss, motherhood, politics, folklore, literary criticism or literature, Kimiko Hahn's poems are marked by passion, intelligence and immediacy. Above all, they reflect her willingness to engage in a fierce and loving dialogue with the world around her. - explanASIAN Fall 1995 The Unbearable Heart is a remarkably moving and cerebral book of poems by Kimiko Hahn, a Japanese American woman with a profoundly sensuous and intelligent apprehension of women's experience. A significant accomplishment, Kimiko Hahn's The Unbearable Heart begins by mourning one woman's death and ends by affirming the lives of all women. Its intricate art, vigorous thought, and distinctive blend of Asian and American sensibility declare it an authentic gem of contemporary poetry. - Salem Press