Eugenia Leigh
My Father Erupts
from a seven-year estrangement
to die, for good this time,
of a flood
sloshing around his lungs
as cancer climbs up his neck.
I wanted better
reunion music. I wanted him
to go out singing.
The best word I’ve got
is noisy. His dying, noisy. And this
in the year of apocalypses. The fires,
the virus, the human
rights abuses a blur against
the din of his vituperative exit.
Eugenia Leigh reads “My Father Erupts”
Eugenia Leigh is a Korean American poet and the author of Bianca (Four Way Books, 2023) and Blood, Sparrows and Sparrows (Four Way Books, 2014). Her poems and essays have appeared in numerous publications including The Nation, Poetry, Ploughshares, Waxwing, and the Best of the Net anthology. The recipient of Poetry’s Bess Hokin Prize as well as fellowships and awards from Poets & Writers, Kundiman, and elsewhere, Eugenia received her MFA from Sarah Lawrence College and serves as a poetry editor at The Adroit Journal.