Steve Castro’s one-sentence poem “Pillar of Fire,” which appears in Grey Sparrow Journal, demonstrates the kind of loss and hope for renewal that permeates Castro’s work: “The sunbeam that penetrated through the windowpane of their humble shack, seemed to be the only thing holding it up.” The prose poem and poem here, “Through the right ventricle,” and “Two unique souls” give a similar sense that even in the worst of situations, humanity might just be clever enough to survive. Castro was born in Costa Rica and later moved to southern Indiana. He has a B.S. in Recreation Science and a B.A. in Germanic Studies from Indiana University. He recently completed his MFA in creative writing at American University in Washington, D.C.
I had a choice to become fully robot or die. “A robot has no soul,” I said. Complete silence. I knew they could hear me. “Robots do not die, but merely malfunction into oblivion, therefore souls are useless to you bastards!,” I screamed, “but me, I refuse to be implanted with any more artificial parts into my being.” I was born blind, so as a teenager I was implanted with two cameras that would record everything that I ever saw; those visions were then immediately transmitted into a memory chip that was simultaneously implanted into my brain. I have a photographic memory, I can see perfectly in complete darkness; I can also see through the thickest bank vaults, but I lack the tears to weep. During the brief but deadly twelve day war with Russia over Alaska, I was left paralyzed after my M1 Abrams hit a landmine in Anchorage. Infused with a new metallic spine, I run and swim inconceivably faster than I ever could before my paralysis. I also lift incomprehensibly much more weight than I ever could previously, but as the door opened and that soulless creature walked into my confinement chamber holding an artificial heart, two artificial lungs and an artificial brain that it threw contemptuously into the stainless steel floor in front of me, I knew what must be done. I opened up my mouth wide, and I fired my artificial boomerang tongue right through that robot’s right eye. As my tongue returned to me after exiting through that same robot’s left eye, I got up, and with my artificial legs, I ran faster than any cheetah could have ever done through that massive iron door before it was able to close. As I approached the final obstacle to my freedom, I lifted up both of my artificial arms and fired ten lasers out my fingertips that cut the gate to shreds within seconds. As I exited that infernal military compound, I briefly halted as I allowed the fresh morning air to enter my lungs. I then suddenly felt a hollow tip bullet penetrate my heart, but that’s expected, ’cause after all, I’m fully human.