Aldo Amparán
twitter: @skygoneout
Aldo Amparán is a poet, writer, & translator born & raised in the sister cities of El Paso, TX, USA, & Ciudad Juárez, CHIH, MX. He is the author of Brother Sleep (Alice James Books, 2022), winner of the 2020 Alice James Award, and the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts & CantoMundo. His most recent work appears in, or is forthcoming from AGNI, Best New Poets, The Common, Ploughshares, Southeast Review, & elsewhere.
Aldo’s debut poetry collection mourns the passing of loved ones, the violences against queer and immigrant bodies, and the struggles of navigating identity as queer and Mexican American. More recently, he’s interested in exploring the inability of language to express trauma, and the dichotomy of being a witness to border violence and a consumer of violent media.
In the future, Aldo wishes he could write about joy and celebration.
When he isn’t writing, reading, or watching too many movies and shows, Aldo enjoys cooking, coffee, and long walks at night.
Some of his favorite authors include Jericho Brown, Dennis Cooper, Julio Cortazar, Natalie Diaz, Mary Gaitskill, Carmen Maria Machado, Cormac McCarthy, Sharon Olds, Patricia Smith, and Ocean Vuong.
On Aldo’s immediate reading list, you’ll find books by Sumita Chakraborty, Alex Dimitrov, Rachel Eliza Griffiths, & Jihyun Yun.
website: aldoamparan.com
selected publications:
- “Interrogation of the Sodomite” in Kenyon Review Online
- “This Room Will Still Exist” in Foundry
- “Grain” in PANK