The Seven Prisms of My Blood

^{after Yvan Goll}

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“This poem is one of the many memories I have of my mother’s funeral. It was written a year and a half after her sudden death. I was attending MacDowell at the time when I wrote this piece, after just having read Dreamweed by poet Yvan Goll. I was so moved by his poems, which explored death and impending loss. His poems allowed me to tap into my grief, which was still taking shape, which is to say, it was very shapeless and unstable.”
—Khaty Xiong