Publications
Sweet Issue 13.1
A Near Miss - SWEET
Wally was the first to kiss me. Inside a roller rink in New Jersey, let’s say 1988, I sailed around curved corners and pumped my knees in rhythm to hits from Casey Kasem’s American Top 40...
Nominated for a Pushcart Prize and The Best of the Net anthology. Featured as a Creative Nonfiction Sunday Short Read.
First Pages Prize Long-list
Long-listed for the 2020 FIRST PAGES PRIZE
One of 36 writers selected from 600+ submissions from 43 countries in an adjudication of the first five pages of a manuscript-in-progress. One of 7 finalists selected for the inaugural Sandra Carpenter Creative Nonfiction Prize awarded in conjunction.
The Underwater Railroad Vol. 1 (Spring 2020)
Her Prayer - THE UNDERWATER RAILROAD
The day Mom came into contact with the Dami Mission must have opened like her other mornings. Her internal clock nudged her awake. Alone in her queen-size bed, she lay unmoving. There was much to do today, as there was every day, and also nothing to do.
Published by the Saejowi Initiative for National Integration, an NGO supporting North Korean defector resettlement
SLICE Issue 19 cover art by Jeeyoung Lee
His Anger Is Not New - SLICE
On a warm October weekend in a small California East Bay town, my father almost killed his girlfriend without laying a hand on her.
Recognized as a Notable Mention in The Best American Essays 2017
Her Prayer - NINTH LETTER
“You two, and my time with God, are the only things that keep me,” said a mother to her daughters. She focused on the square brass clock mounted on the wall ahead of her: 2:43 p.m. It was Wednesday, October 28, 1992. The day we waited, waited for God to lift us up into heaven at 3 p.m., Eastern Standard Time.
Featured in VELA’s “Women We Read This Week"
Fourth Genre 19:2 cover image by Dan Johnson
The Natural Order of Things - FOURTH GENRE
We slept on yellow floors that burned at night. You called them ondol. Paper-screen doors I pushed and pulled, smooth to my exploring touch—until my stubby fingers poked jagged holes. Through these ruptures I peeked into rooms the screens were meant to shield. A house that was flimsy where it should have been solid. I said to you, I don’t like it here, Daddy, when can we go home?
Nominated for a Pushcart Prize
My family’s safety feels more tenuous than ever. It’s time I live up to my legacy.
THE WASHINGTON POST
Days after the election, I realized my vote for Hillary Rodham Clinton was like a penny that you toss into one of those dusty, help-beat-cancer jars on store counters.
Rumpus artwork by Jen Fabish
The Name Before My Name - THE RUMPUS
If we had patience and time and paper and pen, I’d have explained the lines, curves, and ticks striking together to create meaning. I’d have etched Chinese characters, hanja, the ancient tree from which every Korean name is derived, but I didn’t know how to write the strokes that my mother’s father showed me in Seoul nearly two decades earlier, the last time I saw him alive.