by Stephen Nelson
Bloodbending
When I was born I refused to open
my eyes. The light
too piercing. Glaciers formed around
my pupils,
threatened to shipwreck.
My parents’ imagination plunged
into those chromosomes as if they added
mass to my existence. My mother
laments when her genes
dominate my father’s. She sees herself
in my brother’s copper rings. Would she rip apart
the nucleotides that tie him to her?
What is a body other than a river
contained? I follow the path
of the moon climbing from zero-
point to zero point. My hands
grasping, molding my blood.
Gustavo Barahona-López is a poet and educator from Richmond, California. In his writing, Barahona-López draws from his experience growing up in a Mexican immigrant household. His micro-chapbook Where Will the Children Play? is part of the Ghost City Press 2020 Summer Series. A VONA alumn, Barahona-López’s work can be found or is forthcoming in Iron Horse Literary Review, Cosmonauts Avenue, The Acentos Review, Apogee Journal, Hayden’s Ferry Review, among other publications.
Stephen Nelson is a Scottish writer and visual poet who works in a variety of forms including concrete poetry, asemic writing, fiction and prose poetry. He has exhibited in several countries including Italy, Germany, Argentina, Brazil and at the 2011 Text Festival in Bury, England. His textual poetry has appeared in journals internationally, including Posit, Eratio and Anthropocene Journal, and in three full collections. A poem from his book, Lunar Poems for New Religions, was published in The Sunday Times Poet’s Corner. He speaks eight language, practises meditation, and enjoys living by a burn in a town in central Scotland.