The historical Silk Road was a complex network of trade routes that connected people of all different cultures. Paper, silk and porcelain were the most valued physical treasures, forming unlikely links between nations, cities and individuals.

Baylina Pu’s poems are maps: exploring identity and kinship, nature and humanity. Her writing is the paper, silk, and porcelain that travels from hand to hand, uniting people from unique walks of life.

From the mythic to the quotidian, these words capture moments of time and place that are at once distant and universal.

About the Author

Baylina Pu is a senior at Albemarle High School in Charlottesville, Virginia. She has loved language her whole life and has been a poet and storyteller since she was young, inspired by the life and energy of the world around her. She is currently the co-editor-in-chief of her school’s literary art magazine and president of the poetry club. In addition to writing poetry and fiction, Baylina enjoys doing art, creating music, acting, and making puns.

The poems in this collection have won numerous awards, including the National Silver Medal in the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards (2018); Finalist in the Nancy Thorp Poetry Contest (2018); second place in the Virginia Teen Golden Nib Writing Contest (2017); and first place in Poetry in the Virginia High School League (2017).