Roy Kiyooka’s reputation as an artist has long been recognized. Such is not the case with his writing and poetry, even though his engagement with language as a medium of artistic consciousness had been a preoccupation all along. For Kiyooka the poet, the poetic text was not a supplement to his visual art, but a medium that he explored in the same spirit and imagination as that of his other work. His poetry reflects his life-long intellectual engagement with the aesthetics of experience and his artistry in transforming the elements of language into poetic texts striking for their care with words, syntax, and the multiform spaces of the imagination.

This publication makes evident his collective poetic achievements by bringing together all of his most important poetic works, including many that have only been available in very limited editions. Preparation of this publication had begun in the year preceding Kiyooka’s death. Editor Roy Miki and Kiyooka had planned a collaborative form for determining its design and content. With the Kiyooka Estate’s permission, Miki has continued with the editorial responsibility of seeing it through to completion. Included are editorial and bibliographic notes on each of the titles as well as an essay on Kiyooka’s life as a poet. The title, Pacific Windows, is Kiyooka’s own.

Roy K. Kiyooka
From the late 1950s until his death, Roy Kiyooka lived his time intensely, as is evident in his innovative work and in the diversity of his concerns: as visual artist, as sculptor, as film-maker, as photographer and, of course, as a writer and poet. His works include Pacific Windows: Collected Poems of Roy K. Kiyooka and The Artist and the Moose: A Fable of Forget, a novella surrounding the mysterious death of Tom Thomson.

Roy K. Kiyooka's profile page

Roy Miki's profile page

• Winner, Association of Asian Americal Studies Poetry Award