Mourning and Mayhem

This anthology of poems by Gemma Ortwerth were written with discomfort in mind.

Mourning and Mayhem: Discomfort Guaranteed is a four-poem chapbook that offers no gentle resolution. It accuses the individual and the systems they uphold. It names how survival was made expensive, how the earth was emptied in the name of progress, how the decisions that broke us were made in rooms full of people who have never had to choose between filling a prescription and keeping the power on. It calls the goddess by her names. It holds the reader accountable for what erupts in them while reading.

Compassion. Sorrow. Regret. Disdain.

What you feel is not the poems. It is you.

This is political poetry for readers who understand that the earth is not a metaphor. It is a body. We broke it. We are still breaking it. These poems refuse to let you forget what we have done and what we are still doing.

Read. Begin. Be changed.