Edited by Rajini Srikanth and Esther Y. Iwanaga
 

Acknowledgements     xiii

Introduction     xv
RAJINI SRIKANTH
 

PART 1

Introduction
The Voice That Passes through Me, An Interview with Meena Alexander     3
ESTHER IWANAGA AND RAJINI SRIKANTH

How My Stories Were Written     10
CARLOS BULOSAN

The Grandfather of the Sierra Nevada Mountains     14
MAXINE HONG KINGSTON

The Faintest Echo of Our Language     21
CHANG-RAE LEE

From Among the White Moon Faces:
An Asian American Memoir of Homelands     29
SHIRLEY GEOK-LIN LIM

From My Own Country:
A Doctor’s Story of a Town and Its People in the Age of AIDS     38
ABRAHAM VERGHESE

From Where the Body Meets Memory     46
DAVID MURA

From Ono Ono Girl’s Hula     52
CAROLYN LEI-LANILAU

Pa     59
LOUNG UNG 
 

PART 2

Introduction
Absorbing and Being Absorbed by Poetry     69
EILEEN TABIOS 

(Untitled)     77
FRANCES CHUNG

Filling the Gap     78
LAWSON FUSAO INADA

Thirty Years Under     80
MITSUYE YAMADA

Cincinnati     81
MITSUYE YAMADA

Smokey’s Getting Old     83
JESSICA HAGEDORN

Recipe     85
JANICE MIRIKITANI

Why Is Prepared Fish a Political Act?     86
JANICE MIRIKITANI

Yellow Light     87
GARRETT HONGO

The Gift     89
LI-YOUNG LEE

Urban Love Songs     90
WING TEK LUM

The Chocolatier     93
TINA KOYAMA

Strawberries     94
ERIC CHOCK

This Room and Everything in It     96
LI-YOUNG LEE

From “In Search of Evanescence”     98
AGHA SHAHID ALI

Andy Warhol Speaks to His Two Filipino Maids     100
ALFRED A. YUSON 

Not Much Art     101
INDRAN AMIRTHANAYAGAM

Ceylon     103
INDRAN AMIRTHANAYAGAM

The Floral Apron     105
MARILYN CHIN

Kala Gave Me Anykine Advice Especially about Filipinos When I Moved
to Pahala     106
LOIS-ANN YAMANAKA

A Conservative View     108
CATHY SONG

The Founding of Yuba City     110
CHITRA DIVAKARUNI

Prints     112
CHRISTIAN LANGWORTHY

Reading the Poem about the Yew Tree     113
REETIKA VAZIRANI

News of the World     114
MEENA ALEXANDER

The Young of Tiananmen     116
MEENA ALEXANDER

They Don’t Think Much about Us in America     117
ALFRREDO NAVARRO SALANGA

Walls     119
LUIS H. FRANCIA

Beetle on a String     120
VINCE GOTERA

Ch’onmun Hak     121
WALTER K. LEW

Zenith     123
BARBARA TRAN

The Bitterness of Bodies We Bear     125
BAO-LONG CHU

The Dead     127
LINH DINH

Sister Play     128
LAN DUONG

From The Redshifting Web     129
ARTHUR SZE

Projections     130
CHRISTIAN LANGWORTHY
 

PART 3

Introduction
In That Valley Beautiful Beyond     133
GARY PAK

In the Land of the Free     140
SUI SIN FAR

The Story of a Letter     147
CARLOS BULOSAN

He Who Has the Laughing Face     161
TOSHIO MORI

Seventeen Syllables     154
HISAYE YAMAMOTO

From No-No Boy     164
JOHN OKADA

From Clay Walls     170
KIM RONYOUNG

Melpomene Tragedy     179
THERESA HAK KYUNG CHA

Railroad Standard Time     185
FRANK CHIN

Batista and Tania Aparecido Djapan     190
KAREN TEI YAMASHITA

The Valley of the Dead Air     195
GARY PARK

Rated-L     203
R. ZAMORA LINMARK

Our Lady of Kalihi     205
R. ZAMORA LINMARK

A New Beginning     206
JOHN YAU

Kim     213
JANA MONJI

Seeds     219
MONIQUE T. D. TRUONG

Fredo Avila     226
GINA APOSTAL

A Difference Background     236
NURUL KABIR

Elvis of Manila     243
ERIC GAMALINDA

From Monkey King     250
PATRICIA CHAO

From A Cab Called Reliable     257
PATTI KIM

The Goddess of Sleep     260
GINU KAMANI

From The Necessary Hunger     264
NINA REVOYR

Western Music     272
LINH DINH

Chagrin     280
TAHIRA NAQVI

From The Foreign Student     285
SUSAN CHOI

Show and Tell     291
ANDREW LAM

Mrs. Sen’s     299
JHUMPA LAHIRI

The Shylocks     313
CYNTHIA IGNACIO

PART 4

Introduction
Asian American Theater Awake at the Millennium     323
ROBERTA UNO

From Eye of the Cocunut     333
JEANNIE BARROGA

From Assimilation     340
SHISHIR KURUP

Mask Dance     351
RICK SHIOMI

From Mua He Do Lual Red Fiery Summer     387
LE THI DIEM THUY

From Three Lives     395
ALEX LUU

From Texas     398
JUDY SOO HOO