When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Future Possibilities (Book Review)

by Sophia Chen

TW for the F-slur and just general homophobia (obviously in the book, not the review)

When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Future Possibilities is, believe it or not, a book title. It's the debut collection of a Chinese-American poet named Chen Chen -- and no, I didn't mistype; that's just his name. Two Chens. Believe it or not.

When I first saw this book on the library shelf and took it down to read the blurb, I was immediately interested. As a Chinese-American person myself, and a queer one at that, I'm constantly looking for books reflecting my own experience (they're not exactly common in the market, unsurprisingly), and the idea of someone similar to myself speaking on their own experiences drew me in instantly.

First impression of the book: loads of figurative language. Personification especially is all over the place, which of course isn't a bad thing. I found myself impressed by the parallels Chen made between the nature of non-living objects and living ones -- for example, calling a mango "merciless to chin and shirtfront." It was so stunningly accurate, and yet it was a phrase I would never have thought to use, especially not in reference to a mango.

As often as it hit the spot, though, the figurative language in Chen's poetry was often just... too much, frankly. The language was so abstract at times that I found myself with no idea what the man was talking about. This was increasingly true as the book progressed, and I honestly had to stop reading for a week because the mental gymnastics I was doing to understand the book was burning me out. Maybe it was because I'm just not creative enough to read between the lines, but come on. Who can look at the sentence "I want to be a sweetheart, full of goats and xylophones" and know what's going on?

That doesn't mean I didn't like the book. Sure, it was more difficult to get through some sections than others, but overall the collection had some wonderful things to say about life. For one, it (as I had predicted) definitely spoke to me on a deeper level than the average novel. It dealt with topics that were largely reflective of my own experiences or fears, such as complex parent-child relationships, coming out of the closet, and the struggles of staying tied to your culture as a first-generation immigrant growing up in a foreign country. There were also complex themes that I didn't have as much firsthand experience with, such as religious guilt, and the strong descriptions Chen provided helped me better understand the feeling of that experience.

Despite its title, When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Future Possibilities is a relatively short book, as is customary for poetry collections. Within those 104 pages, though, Chen is able to pack in figurative language that's abstract sometimes to the point of incomprehensibility, a story that isn't linear but is better for it, and oceans of emotion. That's what really cemented my opinion of the book: the feelings I felt while reading it. Despite its shortcomings, When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Future Possibilities is one of few books that have both touched me to the core and made me feel less alone in the world. I don't know if I would recommend this book for those who prefer straightforward, to-the-point writing, but for those who enjoy deeply figurative poetry, I definitely would.