Polishing the Silver

‘There’s a touch of both Dickinson and Larkin in Jennifer Chrystie’s mature exhumation of the tales and tropes of family. Figures who could so easily flit like phantoms in her well honed poetry are palpably enjoying an after-life in the poet’s ability to redeem through deep understanding. The collection arcs from, at one extreme, the parsimonies of the household, to the transcending delights of the natural world. These poems undo any doubts about the poetic power of the domestic muse.’ – Kris Hemensley‘From a gathered childhood of rabbits and pumpkin, firewood and lamb chops – all the marks of dailiness remembered – these evocative lyrics move on into adult variegation: into losses, change and travel. Everywhere they are fuelled by the poet’s visual acuity.’ –  Chris Wallace-Crabbe‘This substantial collection confirms the skills that Chrystie has demon-strated in individual poems previously published: illuminating description and tough exploration of ordinary human experience, and the ability to move, with apparent ease, into its mythic possibilities.’ – Aileen Kelly