Ouroboros by Lissa Batista – NWVS #183

$17.99

 

There’s no poem quite like a Lissa Batista poem—where snakes are defanged by teenage girls, “the morning coffee makes itself,” and everyone talks back to ghosts. This debut chapbook is a portrait of the speaker’s mother, the speaker as mother, and a paean to the “nakedly vulnerable” truths both women carry, in their lives with children and their lives with men. What else can I say? Ouroboros is brilliant, in both the dazzling and the whip-smart sense. It will haunt and inspire you.
–Julie Marie Wade, author of Skirted and When I Was Straight
 

Eve may have been deceived by the serpent, but the mother in Ouroboros defangs that snake.  Lissa Batista writes exquisite poems celebrating mothers who are full people, sexual beings, with wants and desires beyond caring for their children. From beauty pageant queens to women with “long-colored hair eddying in the wind with split ends,” the mothers in these poems are fierce and free. Batista transports us from Brazil to Miami, from Carnaval to Pottery Barn, through ghazals, haibun, villanelles, and prose poems, delivering a most divine depiction of feminine experience.

–Denise Duhamel

 

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Description

Ouroboros – NWVS #183

by Lissa Batista

Paper

List: $17.99

979-8-88838-688-0

2024

“OUROBOROS” is a vibrant tapestry woven with threads of poetry and prose, inviting readers on a personal journey through the labyrinth of love, loss, and resilience. From mystical encounters where family ties tango with the supernatural, to candid confessions that blend tears and laughter like licorice-induced memories, each piece intertwines cultural heritage with personal reflection. A playful nod to life’s absurdities and a tender embrace of its complexities, this collection is a celebration to the beauty and chaos of the human experience, leaving an indelible mark on the soul of every reader.

Lissa Batista is a Brazilian born poet living in Miami, Florida among iguanas and summer hurricanes. Batista earned a Bachelor’s Degree in English from Florida International University in 2016 and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing, 2023. She has published poems and essays in Prairie Schooner, New York Quarterly, Passengers Journal, Drunk Monkeys, Islandia, West Trade Review, South Florida Poetry Journal, Bellingham Review and a few others. Batista was nominated for both Best New Poets and the Pushcart Prize, and a semi-finalist in the 2023 New Women’s Voiced Chapbook Competition for Finishing Line Press.

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