In Li-Young Lee's "I Ask My Mother to Sing," a speaker listens to their mother and grandmother singing a song about the China of their youth. Through the song, the speaker feels connected to places they've never personally been, as well as to their deceased father. The poem suggests the pain and longing of exile as well as the power of art to connect people to each other and to the past. "I Ask My Mother to Sing" was published in Lee's first poetry collection, Rose, in 1986, and was inspired by his own life; Lee was born in Indonesia to Chinese political exiles, who later fled to the U.S. to escape anti-Chinese sentiment.

• Read the full text of “I Ask My Mother to Sing”

• “I Ask My Mother to Sing” Summary

• “I Ask My Mother to Sing” Themes

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    Art, Tradition, and Memory

    Where this theme appears in the poem:

    • Lines 1-12
  • 

    The Pain of Exile

    Where this theme appears in the poem:

    • Line 2
    • Lines 5-8
    • Lines 13-14

• Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “I Ask My Mother to Sing”

  • Lines 1-4

    She begins, and ...
    ... like a boat.

    

    

    

    

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  • Lines 5-8

    I’ve never been ...
    ... in the grass.

    

    

    

    

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  • Lines 9-12

    But I love ...
    ... fill with more.

    

    

    

    

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  • Lines 13-14

    Both women have ...
    ... stops her song.

    

    

    

    

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• “I Ask My Mother to Sing” Symbols

  • 

    Water

    Where this symbol appears in the poem:

    • Lines 3-4: “he would play / his accordion and sway like a boat.”
    • Lines 7-8: “the rain begin on Kuen Ming Lake, the picnickers / running away in the grass.”
    • Lines 10-13: “how the waterlilies fill with rain until / they overturn, spilling water into water, / then rock back, and fill with more. / Both women have begun to cry.”

• “I Ask My Mother to Sing” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

  • Simile

    

    

    

    

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    Where simile appears in the poem:

    • Line 2: “Mother and daughter sing like young girls.”
    • Lines 3-4: “he would play / his accordion and sway like a boat.”

  • Imagery

    

    

    

    

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    Where imagery appears in the poem:

    • Lines 3-4: “he would play / his accordion and sway like a boat.”
    • Lines 6-8: “nor stood on the great Stone Boat to watch / the rain begin on Kuen Ming Lake, the picnickers / running away in the grass.”
    • Lines 10-12: “how the waterlilies fill with rain until / they overturn, spilling water into water, / then rock back, and fill with more.”

  • End-Stopped Line

    

    

    

    

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    Where end-stopped line appears in the poem:

    • Line 1: “her.”
    • Line 2: “girls.”
    • Line 4: “boat.”
    • Line 5: “Palace,”
    • Line 8: “grass.”
    • Line 9: “sung;”
    • Line 11: “water,”
    • Line 12: “more.”
    • Line 13: “cry.”
    • Line 14: “song.”

  • Consonance

    

    

    

    

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    Where consonance appears in the poem:

    • Line 5: “Peking,” “Summer Palace”
    • Line 6: “stood,” “Stone”
    • Line 7: “Kuen,” “Lake,” “picnickers”
    • Line 10: “waterlilies fill,” “until”
    • Line 11: “overturn,” “spilling”
    • Line 12: “rock back,” “fill”
    • Line 13: “Both,” “begun”
    • Line 14: “But,” “stops,” “song”

• “I Ask My Mother to Sing” Vocabulary

  Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

  • Accordion
  • Peking
  • The Summer Palace
  • The great Stone Boat
  • Kuen Ming Lake
  • (Location in poem: Lines 3-4: “he would play / his accordion”)

• Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “I Ask My Mother to Sing”

  • Form

  • Meter

  • Rhyme Scheme

• “I Ask My Mother to Sing” Speaker

• “I Ask My Mother to Sing” Setting

• Literary and Historical Context of “I Ask My Mother to Sing”

• More “I Ask My Mother to Sing” Resources

  • External Resources

    • Making Sense of His Family's Suffering — An NPR episode in which Lee talks about his family's history, exile, and what it was like for his family when they came to the United States. 

    • The Summer Palace — A World Heritage Journey episode on the Summer Palace. 

    • A Reading of the Poem — Li-Young Lee introduces his poem and reads it out loud.

    • The Poet's Life and Work — A biography of Lee from The Poetry Foundation.

    • A Conversation with Li-Young Lee — An interview with the Los Angeles Review of Books in which Lee discusses how his first collection came about and the use of silence in his work.

  • LitCharts on Other Poems by Li-Young Lee

    • From Blossoms

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