The poems in this collection explore the ways that we, as humans, both relate to and attempt to separate from our own bodies, as well as how we are shaped (and sometimes trapped) by heredity. These expansive concepts are reflected in lyric form, with recurring images of skin, water, blood, and birth connecting a range of narrative material. Throughout, an almost tribal identification with familial mythology conflicts with the desire for bodily agency, the need to claim, impossibly, control over our physical beings.