In The Lost Art of Ironing, the metaphorical iron smooths out life's creases as well as crumpled clothes, with poems about women as lovers, wives, mothers, muses, and editors and curators of their own lives.
Kelly Davis gives us meditations on other writers, including playful new perspectives on famous poems by Eliot and Keats. She considers being Emily Dickinson's best friend and recalls the intoxicating experience of reading Anne Sexton's poetry for the first time. She imagines George Sand and her lover Frédéric Chopin on an ill-fated holiday and listens in to the thoughts of Lisa Gherardini (better known as 'the Mona Lisa'). She also writes, with warmth and honesty, about her family and the small West Cumbrian town where she lives. The collection ends with five modern versions of Shakespeare's best-loved sonnets, looking at time, love and mortality in the digital age, where anyone can create the illusion of eternal youth.
These poems sparkle with wit and wisdom and shed new light on the way women's lives have changed - and not changed.
My mother-in-law lived through the war
and ironed everything - dishcloths, towels, underpants,
every bit of fabric in the house.
She couldn't talk about her feelings
but she ironed beautifully. Her children knew she loved them
because their sheets were always smooth as glass.
"Here is a true poet. No game playing, no showing off, no trying to impress. These poems go straight to the heart of what it means to be alive in the day-to-day world most of us occupy. I'm amazed this is her first collection."
Brian Patten