Patient History◎Tricia Tan

"The poems in Patient History navigate a mother's illness through lush imagery and aquarium mind. The poems are also unafraid to refract illness and memory through different forms... in Patient History, the cataloguing of beautiful images acts as question marks to an uncertain mind, and the uncertainty amidst illness." —Victoria Chang, author of The Trees Witness Everything; Dear Memory: Letters on Writing, Silence, and Grief; and Obit

“Patient history” is a medical term describing the method by which doctors gather information about a patient’s past and present conditions. Yet, how much of a patient’s history do doctors really know, and how much agency do we have in determining our own histories?

Patient History is a whimsical exploration of the typically grim world of sickness and death. Woven from pop culture, fairytales, and East-meets-West childhood memories of growing up in Singapore, these fantasies are cotton candy sweet—osteoporosis becomes Singapore’s signature Chili Crab, a fistula transfigures into fairy, and organs are commemorated as a theme park.