out of emptied cups
explores what it means to be human?a consciousness contained within a
shell that dictates so much of what our experience of life will be.
Including internationally award-winning and shortlisted pieces,
these strongly felt poems interrogate what it means to be a woman in a
world where the female body still preordains so much for the person it
contains. Deliberately weaving in and out of, and cross-referencing,
each other, these poems reveal multiple perspectives on the same or
related narratives.
At times unabashedly political, this book plumbs the poet?s own
experiences of birth, death, loss, treatment/mistreatment and place in
the world?as a woman, as an immigrant, as a parent, as a former
environment journalist/author depicting the decline of our planet, as a
human being questioning our treatment of others based on lines on a map
and ?so many lengths/of slick red tape?.
Collectively these poems strive to cross the boundary between body
and soul. To be filled to overflowing. Emptied. To be simultaneously
half-full, half-empty. To drink deeply of this one precious cup and find
meaning in the traces of what remains??lifting our hearts/out of
emptied cups/and away with them/into the heavens?.