Blood Aria

In meditations ranging from a child's incomprehension of a father's violence to the suffering of those cast out for their sexual desires to the horror of mass shootings, the poems of Blood Aria pulse with an urgency that is both anguished and exalted. And transformative. To experience poems as passionate, as charged with wisdom as these is to enter into a kind of spiritual quest." - Boyer Rickel, author of remanence

"An unflinching look at bigotries and violence seeded in western history, and it intertwines this with personal traumas, grief, and the winding path of finding one's way. These masterfully wrought poems are as fierce as they are wise-they do not comfort but fortify. Nelson's transporting voice will stay with me for a long time." - Ye Chun, author of Lantern Puzzle