**“Peacock works her trademark lyrical magic.” —Alex Gurtis, Rain TaxiA book-length sequence of poems that dares to affirm the vast variety of emotional colors in loss and rejuvenation.**After her husband’s death, Molly Peacock realized she was not living the received idea of a widow’s mauve existence but instead was experiencing life in all colors. These gorgeous poems—joyful, furious, mournful, bewildered, sexy, devastated, whimsical and above all, moving—compose...

“Graceful yet precise, poetic yet deeply rooted in research, this exploration of an overlooked painter is gorgeous — a joy to read. Molly Peacock’s insights and empathy with her subject bring to life both Mary Hiester Reid and her luscious flower paintings.” — Charlotte Gray, author of The Massey MurderMolly Peacock uncovers the history of neglected painter Mary Hiester Reid, a trailblazing artist who refused to choose between marriage and a career...

For the last forty-five years, the distinguished poets Molly Peacock and Phillis Levin have read and discussed nearly every poem they’ve written—an unparalleled friendship in poetry. Here Peacock collects her most important essays on poetic form and traces the development of her formalist aesthetic across their lifelong back-and-forth. A Friend Sails in on a Poem offers a charming, psychologically wise, and metaphorically piquant look at navigating craft and creativity. This is a book both...

Mary Delany was seventy-two years old when she noticed a petal drop from a geranium. In a flash of inspiration, she picked up her scissors and cut out a paper replica of the petal, inventing the art of collage. It was the summer of 1772, in England. During the next ten years she completed nearly a thousand cut-paper botanicals (which she called mosaicks) so accurate that botanists still refer to them. Poet-biographer Molly Peacock uses close-ups of these brilliant collages in The Paper...

“Whatever the subject, rich music follows the tap of Molly Peacock’s baton.”—Washington PostWhen a psychoanalyst became a painter after surviving a stroke, her longtime patient, distinguished and beloved poet Molly Peacock, took up a unique task. Weaving an invigorating tapestry of images, Peacock’s poetry bears witness to a profound role reversal as its author looks back on a forty-year relationship with her one-time analyst, now friend.

“Graceful yet precise, poetic yet deeply rooted in research, this exploration of an overlooked painter is gorgeous — a joy to read. Molly Peacock’s insights and empathy with her subject bring to life both Mary Hiester Reid and her luscious flower paintings.” — Charlotte Gray, author of The Massey MurderMolly Peacock uncovers the history of neglected painter Mary Hiester Reid, a trailblazing artist who refused to choose between marriage and a career...

Acclaimed poet Molly Peacock tracks the vicissitudes of midlife marriage in her saucy, vulnerable, philosophical sixth collection.Demonstrating once again her "luxuriantly sensual imagination" (Washington Post), Molly Peacock celebrates marriage and a two-track life with the man who became her husband. As teenage sweethearts separated by other obligations, they found each other again at midlife. The piquant, sonnet-based poems take as their starting point ...

In The Paper Garden, celebrated poet Molly Peacock explores the remarkable life of 18th-century British gentlewoman-turned-artist Mary Delany. In the 1770s, at the age of 72, the twice-widowed and nearly broke Delany turned her interest in botany into beautiful paper "mosaick" flowers still revered today. ". not only an introduction to a unique artist, but also a whole bouquet of thoughts and observations about the flow of life."-Washington Post

August 18, 2020, marked the centennial of the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. In 1920, women wearing yellow roses stood shoulder to shoulder in Tennessee, awaiting the roll call of men who would cast their votes for or against a woman’s right to a voice in government.Though this movement won rights for some women—an achievement to be acknowledged and celebrated—the struggle did not end there. Due to states’ laws and prohibitive policies, ...