Summary4 min read

The Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily

Episode 1404: Before Lunar New Year, Our Mothers Go Missing by Uyen Phuong Dang
Host: Maggie Smith
Date: November 26, 2025

Episode Overview

In this episode, host Maggie Smith reflects on the complexity of mother-daughter relationships and the invisible bonds passed between generations. Centered around Uyen Phuong Dang’s poem “Before Lunar New Year, Our Mothers Go Missing,” the episode delves into the ways we come to understand our mothers—sometimes only after distance or loss—and the cyclical nature of familial care, labor, and affection. Through the lens of poetry, Smith invites listeners to consider the ties between tradition, memory, and language.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Seeing Our Mothers as People (01:35–02:42)

Maggie Smith shares personal reflections on the way children often fail to truly see their mothers as individuals until adulthood, or separation provides perspective.
- “When I was young and still living at home, my mother was the water I swam in and the air I breathed. I don’t think there was enough separation between us for me to see who she was.” (01:53)
She discusses the way humor carries truths about identity and distance:
- “I joke that it took me until my twenties, living apart from her, to see her fully as a person with her own regrets, desires, anxieties and pleasures. I joke about that, but like most jokes, there is a little kernel of truth inside.” (02:08)

2. Introduction to the Poem and Its Themes (02:42–03:00)

Smith frames Uyen Phuong Dang’s poem as rooted in cultural ritual (the Lunar New Year) yet “timeless, seasonless.”
She sets the stage for exploring lineage, generational learning, and the nuances between mothers and daughters.

“Before Lunar New Year, Our Mothers Go Missing”

Read at (03:00–05:25)
By Uyen Phuong Dang

Highlights and Key Lines

The poem catalogs all the things mothers teach their daughters, from domestic skills to emotional survival:
- “So we learn how to hang our clothes, how to carry rice on chopsticks to cleave things, to braise ox bones and slice lemongrass...” (03:05)
- “We learn how to pleat a dumpling until it inherits the folds of their foreheads, their hands, the wings around their mouths.” (03:26)
It acknowledges the silent labor and emotional inheritance that often goes unseen:
- “We learn how to scrub the toilet until our palms steam, porcelain haze floating over our heads for days.” (03:38)
The tensions and transformations in understanding language across generations:
- “We have learned the language of our daughters, of vaping and shipping and TikTok and shazam and because we have silkened their curses into silence, we learn the language of our daughters because they are our daughters.” (04:22)
The poem closes on the notion of hope, longing, and the cyclical return of love and care:
- “But we know they will be back, and they will be hungry because back home is ahead of them and we have piled all those prayers into a hill where they will find the house and us silent as trees, the moon moating our heads, loaning them its light.” (05:09)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

Maggie Smith on familial perspective:

“Sometimes I wonder what my children will remember about me when I’m gone.” (01:35)
On distance revealing identity:

“It took me until my twenties, living apart from her, to see her fully as a person with her own regrets, desires, anxieties, and pleasures.” (02:08)
From the poem (on intergenerational learning):

“We learn how to pleat a dumpling until it inherits the folds of their foreheads, their hands, the wings around their mouths.” (03:26)
From the poem (on adopted language):

“We have learned the language of our daughters, of vaping and shipping and TikTok and shazam...” (04:22)
From the poem (on memory and return):

“We have piled all those prayers into a hill where they will find the house and us silent as trees, the moon moating our heads, loaning them its light.” (05:13)

Timestamps for Important Segments

Intro & Ad Skipped: (00:00–01:35)
Personal Story: Wondering What We’ll Be Remembered For: (01:35–02:08)
On Seeing Our Mothers as People: (02:08–02:42)
Poem Context & Introduction: (02:42–03:00)
Reading of “Before Lunar New Year, Our Mothers Go Missing”: (03:00–05:25)

Tone, Language, and Atmosphere

The episode retains Maggie Smith’s gentle, contemplative tone, favoring warmth and introspection.
Both Smith’s reflection and Dang’s poem use vivid imagery and sensory language to explore the layered experiences of womanhood, generational labor, and cultural tradition.

Summary

This episode eloquently explores how daughters simultaneously inherit, reinterpret, and struggle to articulate the lessons and legacies of their mothers. Through the careful reading of Dang’s heartfelt poem and Smith’s reflective framing, listeners are invited to acknowledge the invisible work of care and the transformation of familial bonds across time and cultural change. The episode resonates with anyone who contemplates the intricate power and grief of learning from, loving, and ultimately seeing one’s mother.

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Transcript6 lines

[00:00]
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[01:35]
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I'm Maggie Smith, and this is the Slowdown. Sometimes I wonder what my children will remember about me when I'm gone. I wonder what they'll tell people who ask, what was your mom like? Or what did you learn from her? I know from experience how difficult it is to talk about our mothers. When I was young and still living at home, my mother was the water I swam in and the air I breathed. I don't think there was enough separation between us for me to see who she was. I joke that it took me until my twenties, living apart from her, to see her fully as a person with her own regrets, desires, anxieties and pleasures. I joke about that, but like most jokes, there is a little kernel of truth inside. Today's poem references the Lunar New Year, which happens in February, but it's a timeless, seasonless poem. It has me thinking about the relationship between mothers and daughters and between one generation and the next. Before Lunar New Year, our mothers go missing By Yuen Fong Dung so we learn how to hang our clothes, how to carry rice on chopsticks to cleave things, to braise ox bones and slice lemongrass and pan fry morning glory to regrow green onions in small glass jars, how to read tea leaves like their knuckles, to pleat a dumpling until it inherits the folds of their foreheads, their hands, the wings around their mouths. We learn how to scrub the toilet until our palms steam porcelain haze floating over our heads for days. We learn how to sweep and swat without a sound catching invisible hair and flies in our fists in our sleep and we hear our daughters in our dreams laughing, calling us miraculous. We learn how to toss things, McDonald's toys, nectarine peels, tiger beer cans, melon seeds, toothpicks, the dirt grinning under our nails. But we keep the scorn our daughters teethed into our skin because we have learned the language of our daughters, of vaping and shipping and TikTok and shazam and because we have silkened their curses into silence, we learn the language of our daughters because they are our daughters. We learn how to see by the light of anything, by kitchen blades and by metal spoons, by spilled milk and spit and scars and the silvered strands our daughters tweezed from our scalps and as they told us how beautiful we are, how sorry they are, we learned to see by the grief they kept brighter than anything we owned. We learned how to curl our tongues seven times before we spoke, how to break our backs on the stars, how to light incense in the dark, to roll the smoke into the names of our mothers, to sew our lips around their absence. But we know they will be back, and they will be hungry because back home is ahead of them and we have piled all those prayers into a hill where they will find the house and us silent as trees, the moon moating our heads, loaning them its light. The Slowdown is a production of American Public Media in partnership with the Poetry Foundation. To get a poem delivered to you daily, go to slowdownshow.org and sign up for our newsletter. Find us on Instagram @downdownshow and blueskylowdownshow.org. Hey, it's Maggie. Every weekday, the Slowdown delivers the creativity and care of poetry to all free of charge, and your support makes it possible. Donating to the Slowdown is easy. Just go to slowdownshow.org/donate to make your gift in less time than it takes to listen to an episode.