Biological Composition of a Drop of Seawater is Reminiscent of the Blood in My Veins

A poetry collection about oceanic grief, the tides of time, the currents that connect us all, and the waves that change us.The biological composition of a drop of seawater is reminiscent of the blood in my veins was written in the wake of the death of Simonsen's father. The narrator of the collection navigates his grief and his conflicted sense of masculinity by wandering about an unidentified Faroese village. A complex temporal understanding ebbs and flows throughout, consistently oscillating between the linear and the cyclical, between life and death, blood and the sea, between biology and philosophy. As the narrator grieves what has been lost, he reimagines and rekindles a kinship with all matter that, in the end, helps him find a new way to connect with his late father, himself, and a more-than-human world that does not rely on nationalist myths or toxic masculinity.

Nordic Council Literature Prize nominee Kim Simonsen is a Faroese poet and researcher from the island of Eysturoy. Simonsen has authored seven books, as well as numerous essays and academic articles. In 2014, Simonsen won the national book award of the Faroe Islands, M.A. Jacobsen's Virðisløn, for his poetry collection What good does it do for a person to wake up one morning this side of the new millennium (Deep Vellum Publishing, 2025). His poetry has recently appeared in Columbia Journal, Best Literary Translations 2025, Washington Square Review, Plume, and Notre Dame Review.Randi Ward is a poet, translator, lyricist, and photographer from West Virginia. Ward has twice won the American-Scandinavian Foundation's Nadia Christensen Prize, the only times the prize was awarded to literary work translated from the Faroese. Ward's translations of Faroese poetry have appeared in some of the world's premier publications showcasing international literature, such as Words Without Borders, World Literature Today, Asymptote, and Best Literary Translations 2025. The government of the Faroe Islands honored Ward in 2024 with Heiðursgáva Landsins, a national award for distinguished service to Faroese culture.