{"title":"Elana Bell","description":"\u003cp\u003eElana Bell is a poet, sound practitioner, and sacred creative. Her debut poetry collection, \u003ci\u003eEyes, Stones\u003c\/i\u003e (Louisiana State University Press 2012), was selected by Fanny Howe as winner of the 2011 Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets. Her writing has appeared in \u003ci\u003eHarvard Review\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eMassachusetts Review\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eAGNI\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eBarrow Street\u003c\/i\u003e, and elsewhere. She is the recipient of grants and fellowships from the Jerome Foundation, the Edward Albee Foundation, the Brooklyn Arts Council, the AROHO Foundation, and the Drisha Institute. She was a finalist for the inaugural Freedom Plow Award for Poetry \u0026amp; Activism from Split This Rock, an award that recognizes and honors a poet who is doing innovative and transformative work at the intersection of poetry and social change.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eElana leads creative writing workshops for women, seniors, educators and youths in Israel and Palestine, and throughout the five boroughs of New York City. She has taught her acclaimed Writing Toward Peace curriculum internationally with Seeds of Peace, the Tent of Nations, and Encounter, offering transformative creative writing workshops to support dialogue and peacebuilding for educators and community members from regions in conflict. Elana currently teaches poetry to actors at The Juilliard School, and sings with the Resistance Revival Chorus, a group of women activists and musicians committed to bringing joy and song to the resistance movement. She lives with her husband and son in Brooklyn. For more information, please visit \u003ca href=\"http:\/\/elanabell.com\" title=\"Visit Elana Bell's website for more information\"\u003eelanabell.com\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"mother-country","title":"Mother Country","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003ci\u003eMother Country\u003c\/i\u003e examines the intricacies of mother–daughter relationships: what we inherit from our mothers, what we let go, what we hold, and what we pass on to our own children, both the visible and invisible.\u003c\/strong\u003e As the speaker gradually loses the mother she has always known and upon whom she has always depended to early onset Parkinson’s disease and mental illness, she asks herself: “How do you deal with the grief of losing someone who is still living?” The caregiving of a child to her parent is further compounded by anxiety and depression, as well as the pain of a miscarriage and the struggle to conceive once more. Her journey comes full circle when the speaker gives birth to a son and discovers the gap between the myths of motherhood and a far more nuanced reality. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003ePraise for\u003cem\u003e Mother Country\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"\u003cem\u003eMother Country\u003c\/em\u003e is in large part about the body. The body, like a country, holds so much, and all at once. So much doubt, joy, pleasure, power, uncertainty, pain, family, beloveds, the individual, the collective. There is life; there is loss; there is miracle. The collective has power to sustain the individual. The individual also harness their own power.\" \u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Rumpus\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e“\u003ci\u003eMother Country\u003c\/i\u003e is a breathtaking and mythical account of the complex, everyday, and porous realms of death and birth. With lyrical, imagistic intelligence and unwavering precision, Bell writes the deaths of her unborn children, her grandmother, versions of herself and of her mother. The result is a steadfast and achingly clear record of a woman's mother-route, which, among other things, traces the shape of her own mother's life and illness. She writes: ‘Through the dark I feel my mother's wild eye.’ And: ‘My mother was a dead doll I held her \/ hand in the land of the dead \/ and did not turn away...’ Gravid with loss, Bell's is a haunting, vital, songful work, and it does not turn away.” \u003cb\u003e—Aracelis Girmay, author of \u003ci\u003eKingdom Animalia\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003cem\u003ethe black maria\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e“Mother Country provides us passage through the many portals of what it means to be, alternately, dependent upon or responsible for another’s nurture. And like the experience itself, these poems are both comforting and terrifying. Elana Bell has put to language an experience so intrinsic to its moments, I did not know how it might be brought to life in a poem. One leaves these poems changed, even healed, by their beauty and deep humanity. This book is not just for mothers. It’s for everyone.\" \u003cb\u003e—Cate Marvin, author of \u003ci\u003eOracle\u003c\/i\u003e and co-founder VIDA: Women in Literary Arts\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch4\u003eDropping My Mother Off at the Electro-Convulsive Therapy Ward\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eDo I look strange?\u003c\/i\u003e she asks.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe other patients with their flyaway hair\u003cbr\u003e\u0026amp; unblinking eyes wander the floor.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eYou look like a movie star.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe nurses suggest I get some air.\u003cbr\u003eHer eyes widen as I edge toward the door,\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eleaving her in gloved hands, quick\u003cbr\u003efor a cure.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs a girl I followed her\u003cbr\u003edown any steep or muddied path.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI catch my face in the sharp fluorescence\u003cbr\u003eof the bathroom mirror.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHave my dark eyes darkened?\u003cbr\u003eWas that shadow there before?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWho will I follow when she is gone?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhen they wheel her back to me:\u003cbr\u003efaint bloom of urine on her gown.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat happened in that room\u003cbr\u003ewhile I drank coffee just outside the door?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMother, I’ve done what you would never do.\u003cbr\u003eWalked you to the edge, then turned away.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"BOA Editions, Ltd.","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":32082755584081,"sku":"9781950774197","price":17.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0982\/0178\/products\/MotherCountry_FC.jpg?v=1587558092"}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0982\/0178\/collections\/Elana-_Hallie_Easley-23.jpg?v=1587052329","url":"https:\/\/shop.boaeditions.org\/collections\/elana-bell.oembed","provider":"Boa Editions","version":"1.0","type":"link"}