Phantom Limbs

Written by Lee Min-ha - translated from Korean by Jein Han 

First published in Korean in 2005, Phantom Limbs is Lee Min-ha’s debut book of poetry. Critically lauded for its visceral imagery and world-building through word-play, this collection of surreal and fabulistic poems reminds readers that poems are spells and incantations.

Lee Min-ha is a Korean poet based in Seoul. She is the author of five poetry collections including Phantom Limbs (『환상수족』), Musically Scandalously (『음악처럼 스캔들처럼』), Imitation Woods (『모조 숲』), and All the Secrets of the World (『세상의 모든 비밀』). Her most recent book, Microclimate (『미기후』), received the Jihun Award and Sanghwa Award.

"The world of Lee Min-ha’s Phantom Limbs is indeed a haunted one, at turns dreamlike and nightmarish as each poem weighs the risks and rewards of being (not quite) human, of having a body (of sorts). Every image veers wildly from expectation, and even the most surreal moments are convincingly rendered and viscerally felt. Lee’s poetry stuns in Jein Han’s beautiful, painstaking translation.” —Paige Aniyah Morris