Each snapshot of Nezhukumatathil’s life-moving from her childhood to present day-is paired with a particular flora or fauna, and what she learns from these natural wonders. “A catalpa can give two brown girls in western Kansas a green umbrella from the sun.” The opening line acclimates readers immediately to the book’s form as a hybrid of memoir and naturalist study. She writes from both the poet’s perspective and as a person of color in a white-privileged world. Born to a Filipina mother and a father from South India, Nezhukumatathil grew up all over the United States due to the demands of her mother’s job as a psychiatrist, and was immersed in landscapes from New York to Arizona. This collection of essays centers around Nezhukumatathil’s lifelong interactions with and observations of the natural world. No one sees nature quite like a poet and Aimee Nezhukumatathil proves that in World of Wonders, her first book of prose.
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