Ocean Vuong writes this poem in the second person, addressing himself many times throughout it. The way Ocean addresses himself tells the reader he is a person other than the one he's talking to, meaning it sounds like he is separating himself as a whole, which is between his conscious and the unconscious. "Someday I'll love Ocean Vuong" suggests that he does not love himself, and despite knowing that, in the future, there will come a time when he can love himself. His self-love issue speaks to internal conflicts and the desire he has to love himself.

Trauma/repression

"The most beautiful part of your body is where it's headed" is a line in the poem that tells us either a sign of growth where he is growing as a person, or a sign of death and the end of his life, but either way, it emphasizes that he is detached from his physical body. It’s believed that this is encouragement and a sign of growth.

Fear

"Ocean, don't be afraid" is the author telling himself not to feel a certain fear because deep down he does. Despite being afraid and acknowledging he has a fear, this line tells us that he has to get over it, or is trying to, hence the line.

Ocean Vuong’s poem notebook fragments make me feel as if he is showing self-identity and the subconscious thoughts throughout this poem by having explicit language in it as well as the fact that he connects to his family. To begin, this author shows insight throughout the poem, introducing many different topics from his childhood memories to relationships, which all connect in a hard way to explain. In addition, I have also seen that Vuong talks about war and violence, which also makes me believe he has been affected by war in a way where he got displaced, which made me believe this is why he wrote this poem. In this poem, I have also noticed the author trying to use humor and make you understand the pain from the humor. For example, “We don't say goodbye. We say, I'll see you soon. We don't say suicide. We say, He was such a bright light. This is not humor, but he puts it in a way that points out how people avoid talking about death when it's suicide, and it hits you deep. Lastly, he says, “sometimes I feel as foreigner, inside my own skin.” This refers to him having disconnections to his real life, and this also shows he has internal conflict, which relates to post-colonialism. This post-colonialism is shown by the Vietnamese war and how he is a survivor who has been displaced, which has created this self-identity, and putting his subconscious thoughts in this poem gave the readers a way to understand him.