Now available
Graywolf Press, 2025
The saola morphs in purpose and presence across these poems, as Mai Der Vang continues to forge an ecopoetics that embodies intricate intersections of war, colonialism, environment, and refuge.
lit hub
…[A] visually expansive and linguistically captivating collection… Vang’s exquisitely layered contemplations of existence, extinction, location, memory and identity can’t be distilled to one paragraph, nor will one be satisfied by a single reading of this highly anticipated collection.
Chicago review of books
Primordial by Mai Der Vang marks another splendid triumph for the poet. By bringing to the page the saola (an endangered, almost never seen animal mostly in Southeast Asia) alongside a maturing “I,” it brings language to all the lives, places, and histories unseen. The collection delights in exploding known forms and creating new aesthetics as it considers what is environmentally human, animal, and landscape. Her language is focused and luscious, with never a word or a space out of place…
poetry northwest