Salvage

Hedgie Choi is the translator of Pillar of Books by Moon Bo Young and the cotranslator of Hysteria by Kim Yideum, which won the Lucien Stryk Asian Translation Prize and the National Translation Award. Her poetry can be found in Poetry, Catapult, West Branch, and elsewhere. Her fiction can be found in NOON, American Short Fiction, The Hopkins Review, and elsewhere.

“Hedgie’s poems treat our lives with the disrespect they deserve.” - Jackson Holbert “Meet Hedgie Choi, in Salvage, lurking like someone with blue hair, using droll commentary and humor to confront poetry’s great subjects—love, death, and mystery: ‘I am afraid of mystery / but by Mystery I was made / to be afraid.’ These poems thrill with deceptive simplicity, subversion, and candor, jolted by biting critiques of culture, in a tone as accessible as it is original. She writes, for example, with a wink and a nod, ‘I’m too afraid of pain to eat Chinese food / under five dollars. I’m going to live forever.’ I hope she does.” - Jane Miller

• Salvage. . .Laying Down the GroundworkMutualismFreaking OutEqual and OppositeParty TimeNever MindThe Listening SectionBrutal HonestyNourished and EnrichedTyrannosaurAffirmationsPhases. . .HolidayThe Happy MiddleIn Some Ways I Have ChangedIn My Natural HabitatTransformationWhat’s Up ButtercupOrchestrated IntentPracticeEpimetheus at the Tattoo Parlor. . .Prometheus to His Liver Growing OvernightWhen Someone Says a Place on Stage and Only a Handful of People in the Audience Emit an Uncertain WOOOOOOOThank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Thank You Have a Nice DayTemptationMartha’s VineyardIn That LifeClose FriendsEpicBotched Corinthians, Retconned CorinthiansTestimony. . .TenderlyFor Seeing in the DarkHorror Minus TerrorVolunteeringVespertine Is the Name of a Restaurant in LA with an 18-Plus-Course Tasting MenuChild of GodPoem for JacksonWhat about Hell ThenWhen I Wake up from a Bad Dream I Am RavenousIchor, Meaning the Fluid That Flows like Blood in the Veins of Gods, as in Greek Mythology, or, a Watery Discharge from a WoundLessons. . .ArchetypeSummer in Austin, TXMannersPlagiarismNew Year’s EveLast NightWill You Disabuse MeStill. . .AcknowledgmentsNotes