The Dominant Strain

The Dominant Strain: Poems and Letters
By Armando Heredia

A visceral, genre-defying work that dismantles the mythology of purity and gives voice to the erased.

More than a collection of poetry, The Dominant Strain is a literary act of resistance. Armando Heredia forged these poems in the fires of a nation's ongoing trauma, crafting them into sharp, living organisms designed to infect the bloodstream of the body politic. They dissect the language of genetics, faith, and power to expose a devastating truth: the pursuit of a "dominant strain" is an autoimmune disease, a society attacking its own diversity in a slow, spectacular suicide.

The collection's second half gives flesh and blood to the poems' themes through a series of fictional letters-fever dreams and testimonies from the front lines of American history. A woman in a modern-day ICE facility writes a warning to a young girl fleeing violence. A Tsalagi boy on the Trail of Tears sends a message to the future. The grandson of a Selma marcher pens a furious dispatch to Dr. King. A French prisoner demands the melting of the Statue of Liberty. Together, they form a haunting chorus that proves the machinery of domination is old, but the resistance to it is ancient and eternal.

Ideal for fans of: Claudia Rankine's Citizen, the works of James Baldwin, Danez Smith, and the uncompromising historical reckonings of The 1619 Project.

Themes: Poetry of Protest, Systemic Racism, Immigration, Historical Trauma, Resilience, National Identity, Epistolary Fiction, Social Justice.

To read The Dominant Strain is to consent to a procedure. It will hurt. It should. But within its fury lies a profound, unwavering love for humanity and a furious refusal to let it be stolen. This is the record of the fight for the soul of the gene pool. Open it, and join