BARBED WIRE BETWEEN US

Japanese Chinese American author Wenjen and Cuban American artist Encarnación have created a sobering, stupendous reminder of recurring injustice.

Wenjen’s reverso poem “tells a story in verse, and then uses the same phrases, but in reverse, to tell a different story.” “In this land of promise, / we hoped to find a place to belong,” she opens, a promise betrayed by the U.S. government’s ignominious World War II imprisonment of Japanese Americans. The Japanese American story ends with release—“From behind barbed wire, new life will begin”—pivoting into the journey of new migrants crossing borders in search of new opportunities. But history repeats itself as they, too, are imprisoned behind barbed wire, even as they continue to cling to the potential of a “place to belong.” In the backmatter, Wenjen reveals that the setting is Fort Sill in Lawton, Oklahoma, which for roughly 150 years has been the site of unjust incarceration: Chiricahua Apache tribe members in the 1880s, Japanese Americans during WWII, and separated immigrant children since 2014. Encarnación affectingly balances looming fear and violence with quotidian joy (kids jumping rope, playing baseball, and listening to storytimes). She integrates folded cranes, a Japanese symbol of hope, into vibrantly saturated spreads—the contemporary protagonist even discovers a WWII newspaper crane. Small details, particularly the chipped blue nail polish on a child’s bandaged hand, add wrenching realism.

A significant portrayal of ongoing U.S. civil rights violations, exposed through the experiences of young children.