I have found that there is a consistent theme of being the "other" and never being fully accepted into mainstream society. Hongo said: “My project as a poet has been motivated by a search for origins of all kinds, a quest for ethnic and family roots, cultural identity and poetic inspiration – all ultimately linked to my need for an active imaginative and spiritual life. I write to be a voice that I can listen to, a voice that is meaningful and that elevates my own consciousness. Hongo uses descriptive lists and repetitive word order and phrasing. His language is elegant and lyrical. “Something Whispered in the Shakuhachi” in Yellow Light in 1982 by Garrett Hongo. It is an intimate poem. By focusing on an elderly and weakened man, Hongo is able to show a strength of spirit that can transcend the most difficult and humiliating conditions. In this poem, Hongo speaks of an old man hanging in his sleep, a metaphor for his own Japanese origins, which lives in his heart. The old man raves about his talent for carving Shakuhachi. Rather than destroy his precious flutes, he burns them himself, but even after they are gone, he can hear their "groans like fists of wind whistling in the barracks." After the war, when he returned home, the memory of the flutes and their