Breaking a Mare

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.

Christina was awarded a Literature Wales Writer's Bursary, supported by the National Lottery through Arts Council of Wales, for the purpose of researching and drafting the early poems in this collection. This book offers a unique perspective for readers (i.e. the intersection of farm life, horse riding, rodeo, womanhood and ecological awareness); an authentic voice (i.e. as a poet and academic with experience of riding and farm life); and a feminist approach, investing girlhood, goodness, women's work and silence.