This book will be released in April 2025.
Pre-orders are charged at time of order and the book will be posted to you as soon as it becomes available.
UK postage is 99 pence per order.
'What a precision feat this book pulls off. On the one hand, these are poems of sleek physicality – of clasp and bit and buckle and braid – with shrewd things to say about the tyranny of polish and perfection. At the same time, they’re intimately attuned to the charged spaces we occupy and the roles we perform within them, whether it be a rodeo arena, a haunted hayride, a school playground or an empty kitchen... I am, like one of her riders, lovestruck quick for all of it.' – Abigail Parry
‘An exceptional writer, a poet who refuses to “stay quiet”. Her speaker has galloped “out of darkness” urging us now to consider: what has been breaking us, what is it that we can tame, what wildness can we harness?’ – clare e. potter
'A vivid new collection, the farm, the ranch, offer wildness and wonder to a young girl, as she witnesses bodies broken and made strong again. Breaking a Mare shows us that the breaking can be part of the survival.' – Rebecca Goss
It’s summer and the flies are back
and your mare is wild-eyed and uneasy
tossing her head as she trots, jolting
as trucks arrive in the driveway, you
keep kicking, you want to canter:
come on girl, let’s go
Breaking a Mare is an investigation of silence, goodness and girlhood. It invites readers into the barn, the sawdust mill, the rodeo arena. These poems expose the hard work women do on farms, the loss of rural landscapes and the role death can play in these spaces. They ask what it means to be good in the face of physical, emotional and ecological threat. Ultimately, these poems want to know what breaks us and what makes us stronger.
