Catching Bats Takes Patience

All the parts of everyday life are unclothed and transformed in Catching Bats Takes Patience. Mary Kennelly looks at the routine of domestic life and motherhood and picks it apart, revealing a hidden layer of emotion and depth to her everyday life.

Nothing is off limits for Kennelly. Relationships, sex, gender, religion, love and death are all goldmines of heartbreak, anger and nostalgia. In particular, she writes from the heart about motherhood, and the loss and growth that accompanies it. A sense of regret is absent from Kenelly’s collection, opting instead for lessons learned and defiance in the face of negativity.

Kennelly offers a book of poetry described as ‘deceptively simple’; there are no tricky difficulties in which to drown the reader. Touching on a range of bittersweet themes,Catching Bats Takes Patience explores with uncompromising honesty the complexities of life in a beguilingly direct tone.