Description

Break-Up Hair & Other Poems

by Grace Richards

Break-Up Hair and Other Poems explores the possibility of new beginnings as a single woman of a certain age, three years after a heartbreaking failed marriage. The author—now wiser, stronger, and fearless—shares her new sense of self through iconic feminine images drawn from myth, film, and pop culture. Trusting in the healing nature of poetry and art, the poet offers a varied collection to help all women find their unique strength.

Enjoy a Video of Grace Reading from the Book:

Grace Richards — A Featured Poet on The Poetry Box LIVE (Sept. 2023)

Early Praise for Break-Up Hair & Other Poems:

Delicious. In Break Up Hair, Grace Richards gives us a scrumptious collection of verse that is at times sweet, savory, tangy, piquant, bitter, hearty and, oh my, even spicy. The 23 poems each offer unique reflections through many angles of light: reflective, refracted, prismed. A full cornucopia of emotive cuisine served warm on a literary salver. Bon Appétit.

—Theo Czuk, novelist & songsmith

What becomes of a woman unloved? In Grace Richards’ marvelous chapbook, Break-Up Hair, the woman blossoms. These poems, strewn with rose petals, orchids, lilies, and lavender, both delighted and inspired me. As the poet enjoins the reader in the powerful final poem, “The Poet’s Way” Lift your fledgling wings and give voice/ to the verses, billowing in airy, sinuous designs/ like starlings in murmuration.

—Alexis Rhone Fancher, poetry editor, Cultural Daily

Grace Richards’ Break Up Hair is an introspective, illuminating book of verse containing heartache and memories, fantasy and facts, strong-willed assertions, and the many yearnings and turnings of love’s revelations. I read straight through these wonderful verses, then went back and dove deeper. The author seems equally at ease when describing love’s burning intensity or its crashing pain, and I related to some poems as if they were describing my own love experiences. A thoroughly enjoyable journey in 23 poems.

—C. Steven Blue, managing editor, Arrowcloud Press

About the Author:

Grace Richards worked as a technical writer in the early computer industry, as an assistant in the TV and film industry in Los Angeles, and later taught ESL at the college level in Southern California and at the University of Oregon. During the last few most dramatic years, she has found her poetic voice. Her work has been published in Willawaw, Writing in a Woman’s Voice, Herstry blog, and in the anthologies Poems on Poems and Poets and Conestoga Zen. Her first chapbook, Mid-Century Modern and Other Poems, was published in September 2019. She enjoys being part of the creative community in Eugene, Oregon, awestruck by the surrounding beauty of the trees, the ever-shifting clouds amid bright blue sky, and gentle April showers at times turning to snowfall.