Cotton Xenomorph is a literary journal produced with the mission to showcase written and visual art while reducing language of oppression in our community. We are dedicated to uplifting new and established voices while engaging in thoughtful conversation around social justice.

On Days I Wish for My Grandfather’s Brain

by James O’Bannon

The sky is burning again

I said the sky is opening

again the sky is a collection

of god-spit and pretty light

I said the sky is a mother

and granny died and the sky

looks beautiful today I said

the sky has opened the sky

is past tense the sky is a grandmother

the sky is granny dead now

everything I pull from my stomach

is the sky I said the sky has been red

has been blue has been gray has been

black today and is granny still dead?

the sky is alive I said what does

the sky look like today I said how

does granny look today I meant the sky

I mean how does the sky look like my granny

I mean there is a granny for every star

in the sky that loves them too much

to tell them she is leaving I said what

does the sky leave behind I said

where does the sky begin?


James O’Bannon is a writer from Cincinnati, Ohio, seeking to explore themes of Blackness, religion, and longevity through poetry. He received his BA in English from Northern Kentucky University in 2016, his MFA from Fresno State University in 2019 and is an alumnus of the Tin House Workshop. His writing has appeared in Waxwing, Triquarterly, Nomadic Press as part of the Nomadic Ground Series, and Flies, Cockroaches, and Poets, and The Northwest Review.

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