Half–Life

David S. Cho is the proud child of Korean immigrants. He is director of the Office of Multicultural Development at Wheaton College. He is the author of a chapbook, Song of Our Songs, a book of poems, Night Sessions, and a book on twentieth-century Korean American novels, Lost in Transnation.

• I. Sovereign AsymmetriesA Circle of Fragments Existential Poem #1 Existential Poem #2 Existential Poem #3 Gravity’s Pull Spring in Seattle LullabyII. Poems for HarryA Young Boy’s Life1.2.3.4.5.6.7.Growing Up Harry: Harry’s Jr. High Linguistic Lessons1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. The EdgeHarry’s Playboys 1.2.3.4.Cheers for Harry1.2. From the Bleachers3. The Walk HomeThe Locker Room1. 2. The BallerinaAfter the ConcertHarry Meets the FatherPraise for Prozac: Notes from Harry’s JournalIII. Journeys of a HyphenA Love Poem for My WifeThe ApologyEntropy1.2.Chicago Highway Poems1. Lake Shore Drive2. 94 East3. I-90Indiana Highway Poems1. I-652. Route 2313. Lafayette, INThe Hyphen

“David Cho’s poems evoke experiences of growing up Korean American, loving Chicago, and meditating on roadkill at the same time that they signal an awareness of themselves as verbal constructions. Hence, in a poem about the hyphen—that iconic signifier of ethnic American identity—punctuation itself takes on a life of its own; in a poem ostensibly about love for his wife, the speaker offers an encomium to the Windy City; and in a poem about roadkill, the speaker invites the reader to address the dead deer directly. What does it mean to be a second-generation American? How do you write a love poem? What can death teach us? A Half-Life at once grapples with these and other important questions and resists reductive answers.”