33 POETS & WRITERS^profile OCEAN VUONGthe magnetic pull to poetry—Rimbaud,
Lorca, Vallejo, Neruda—copying
poems from library books to his note-
book because he couldn’t afford to buy
books of his own.
Encouraged by his community-
college education, Vuong decided to
pursue a degree—one that could even-
tually lead to a job that would help his
family—so in 2008 he enrolled in
business school at Pace University in
Manhattan. After two weeks, keenly
aware that he didn’t fit in among the
men in business suits and internships,
he dropped out. “I still had my library
card,” he says, “so I rekindled my loveof reading. But I also began attending
open mics to read from my scribbles
in my notebook. I wasn’t ready to call
it poet r y.”
It was at one of these events that he
heard about M FA programs, in which he
could not only nurture his passion but
perhaps also fund it. He was also eager
to get back to college so he could stop
deceiving his mother about his activities
in New York City. Unbeknownst to her,
he had been couch surfing since leaving
Pace. But first he needed to complete his
undergraduate degree. “I applied to the
most affordable place I could find: City
University of New York,” he says. Heended up attending Brooklyn College.
Although he credits Brooklyn
College with giving him access to the
literature he needed to finally feel well-
read, it was the cafés, bookstores, and
other venues that held poetry readings
that gave Vuong the community he was
looking for, forging friendships that
fortified his resolve to keep going. “I
met Saeed Jones,” he recalls, “who was
fabulous and glorious, with a big, hearty
laugh. And when he told me he was at-
tending an M FA program at Rutgers in
Newark, I knew that it was possible.”
Soon after, he connected with poet
Eduardo C. Corral, who at the time
was living in his family’s double-wide
in Casa Grande, Arizona, working at
Home Depot, and running a popular
blog called Lorcaloca. Corral’s blog
gave Vuong a glimpse into the ways
the writing profession welcomed or
rejected writers of color. When Corral
announced he was moving to New York
City in late 2011, Vuong knew this too
was a sign: “We had similar stories—
both of us gay boys from working-class
immigrant parents. He became a kind
of mentor because his journey was like
a map for me.”
Corral recalls their first meeting:
“Ocean’s attentiveness is what first
caught my attention. He was kind and
curious, always asking questions, eager
to listen, to learn. This attentiveness
also extended to language.” Since then
they have stayed in touch, though Cor-
ral contends that theirs is a bond not
forged by literary success but by the
amazing truth that they are sons of non-
English speakers, who have been able
to shape careers and help their families
financially through a profession that, in
effect, excludes their loved ones. “We
now get to write about our immigrant
families and claim a place for them in
poetry,” he adds.
In 2014, prompted by his intimate
but influential writing community,
Vuong applied to M FA programs, but
only in the New York City area because
he wanted to remain close to friends.
He chose NYU because it offered him
funding without teaching obligations.On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous
That night, bellydown on the hardwood, your face resting on a pillow, you asked
me to scrape your back. I knelt beside you, peeled your black T-shirt over your
shoulders, unhooked your bra. Having done this hundreds of times by now, my
hands moved on their own. As the bands fell away, you grabbed the bra, pulled
it out from under you, and tossed it aside. Heavy with sweat from the day’s work,
it landed on the floor with the thud of a knee brace.
The chemicals from the nail salon rose from your skin. I fished a quarter
from my pocket, dipped it into the jar of Vicks VapoRub. The bright eucalyptus
scent filled the air and you started to relax. I dunked the coin, coating it with
the greasy ointment, then dabbed a thumb’s worth across your back, down your
spine. When your skin shone, I placed the coin at the base of your neck and pulled
it outward, across your shoulder blades. I scraped and rescraped in firm, steady
strokes, the way you taught me, until russet streaks rose from under the white
flesh, the welts deepening into violet grains across your back like new, dark ribs,
releasing the bad winds from your body. Through this careful bruising, you heal.
I think of Barthes again. A writer is someone who plays with the body of his mother,
he says after the death of his own mother, in order to glorify it, to embellish it.
How I want this to be true.
And yet, even here, writing you, the physical fact of your body resists my
moving it. Even in these sentences, I place my hands on your back and see how
dark they are as they lie against the unchangeable white backdrop of your skin.
Even now, I see the folds of your waist and hips as I knead out the tensions, the
small bones along your spine, a row of ellipses no silence translates. Even after
all these years, the contrast between our skin surprises me—the way a blank
page does when my hand, gripping a pen, begins to move through its spatial
field, trying to act upon its life without marring it. But by writing, I mar it. I
change, embellish, and preserve you all at once.
You groaned into the pillow as I pressed along your shoulders, then worked
down through the stubborn knots. “This is nice.... This is so nice.” After a while,
your breathing deepened, evened out, your arms slack, and you were asleep.
From On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong. Reprinted by arrangement with
Penguin Press, a member of Penguin Group (USA) LLC, a Penguin Random House
Company. Copyright © 2019 by Ocean Vuong.
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