Editorial Note by Max Wallis

In Soledad Santana’s third and final poem from Issue One the body is not a metaphor, it’s the mechanism.

A grey hair becomes thread, becomes fuse, becomes something passed hand to hand, wrist to waist, mother to child. The poem never explains this. It just does it, again and again, until repetition itself becomes the point. What we inherit is not always chosen, but it is always felt.

There’s also a quiet political pressure running underneath. The language of foetal clots, pavement, country. What is discarded, paved over, and lumped together. The poem refuses sentimentality, but it doesn’t let go of belief either.

I love how the ending turns downwards, into the ground. Not redemption exactly. More a stubborn insistence that something survives, even if it’s buried, even if it takes time to burn its way back up.

Perhaps, really, it’s about how love can be a chain and still be a way through.

Soledad Santana is a Venezuelan, London-based poet, feminist community organiser, and human rights researcher. She’s a current member of the Barbican Young Poets programme. She has co-created various zines, including Tangled Tongues / Lenguas Enredadas, which examines the politics of monolingual publications and self-translation, and collates Spanglish poetry and short fiction.Recently, she’s interested in the new Latin American gothic. Instagram: @Lasoledadsantana

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit aftershockpoetry.substack.com/subscribe