Dressing for the Afterlife is a diamond-tough and tender second collection of poems from British Cypriot poet Maria Taylor, which explores love, life, and how we adapt to the passage of time. From the steely glamour of silent film-star goddesses to moonlit seasons and the ghosts of other possible, parallel lives, these poems shimmy and glimmer bittersweet with humour and brio, as Taylor conjures afresh a world where Joan Crawford feistily simmers and James Bond's modern incarnation is mistaken for an illicit lover. Consistently crisp and vivid, these poems examine motherhood, heritage and inheritance, finding stories woven in girlhood's faltering dance-steps, the thrum of the sewing-machine at the end-days of the rag trade, or the fizz and bubble of a chip-shop fryer. And throughout, breaking through, is the sense of women finding their wings and taking flight - "and her wings, what wings she has" - as Taylor's own poems soar and defiantly choose their own adventures.
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To dress for the afterlife, step into the precise moment you ended a former existence. PROLOGUE
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(@NineArchesPress, 10 September 2020, ebook, 69 pages, borrowed from @natpoetrylib via @OverDriveLibs)
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This is a new poet for me. I really enjoyed Dressing for the Afterlife, her second collection. The poems explore the different identities people try on, change and adapt to during the course of their life, ever-flowing and changing. I enjoyed the style and structure of the poems and the imagery. This is a powerful collection.
