Publisher's Synopsis
Vuyelwa Carlin has established a reputation as a highly distinctive stylist. Published internationally and instantly recognisable, her poems feature an intricate, mosaic-like technique.
Marble Sky, her third collection, is in three varied sections. It opens with 'Bottles of Blood', a series that recalls the poet's childhood in Africa and then further travels as an adult in Poland and America. The second part features the title poem, a meditation on autistic aloneness, and other poems on individuality, disability and what it is to be human. This is followed by narratives inspired by her current life in the Shropshire countryside. The book concludes with 'The Anchorite', a mysterious and moving dramatization of the spiritual life of a religious solitary.
The rich, evocative and original poems in Marble Sky will intrigue and enchant readers.
Vuyelwa Carlin was born in South Africa in 1949, brought up in Uganda, and has lived for many years now in Shropshire. Her poems have appeared in literary journals and anthologies in the UK and abroad. She has published three poetry collections to date and has won prizes in both the Cardiff and National Poetry Competitions. She is also a Hawthornden Fellow. For the past five years she as worked as a carer in an EMI (Elderly Mentally Infirm) unit.
