Salacia

In Mari Ellis Dunning’s debut poetry collection fairy tale figures abound, historical women are revived from the dead, and the intricacies of relationships are examined as they are built and undone. In these poems, women raise their voices and subvert the age-old tales told on their behalf: Roman goddess Salacia explores her tumultuous relationship with Neptune; Gwen Ellis, the first woman hung for witchcraft in Wales, reflects on her impending fate; a Queen bee is usurped by her daughter and depression visits in the emaciated form of an old and forgotten friend. The contours of the Welsh countryside creep through the writings, torment is mapped across the landscape and the flesh, and traumas inflict the body as well as the mind. The sea permeates the verses in this selection – below the surface of the ocean, a mermaid builds her collection of human debris, desperate to fulfil her desire for anthropoid limbs, and a woman plunges to the briny depths, engulfing herself in its warm current. Love, grief, longing, anxiety and mythology fill these stark and honest pages in an existential exploration of human nature and our fallibility, where the dark and sombre moments in life are as precious as the uplifting ones.