Imago

Coming to America as a boy of twelve, the poet's intense memories of his upbringing in the Philippines have held him captive and torn between his motherland and adopted country.

His was a world of bats, kites, mermaids, faith healers and feral dogs; a country where a young boy kills his first chicken; a dream in which a mother reads to her children by candlelight during a monsoon.

These elegiac poems tackle issues of identity, domesticity and sexuality, shattering preconceived notions of Asians and Asian men.

The poet reclaims, redefines and questioningly revisions a past and how it fits into a life in a Westernized society. "Imago" is a confluence of family, history, belonging, desire and self-reckoning.