Description

Book Synopsis

Tender, loving and visceral, Ovarium is a pamphlet of poems about a giant ovarian cyst. The poet charts her journey with the cyst, from diagnosis to surgery to recovery, via a landscape of scanner rooms and hospital wards.

The poems explore the impact of illness, and the body as a site of disgust and shame but also healing and endurance. Ingham’s poems are forensic as she looks at the disorientating and sometimes patriarchal language of anatomy and medicine, and the way illness can change the relationship we have with our own bodies.

I tried to think of you as fruit, growing
against the sun-warm wall of my gut.

Melon-headed, you nudged the leafy organs,
dug out a place for yourself in the plot.

I never guessed. I was only bloody earth
to you, a coldframe full of light.
- from 'Cyst'

Ovarium

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    A Paperback / softback by Joanna Ingham

    £7.00

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    Order before 4pm today for delivery by Mon 5 Oct 2026.

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      Book details

      Publisher The Emma Press
      Published 23 June 2022
      ISBN-13 9781912915972
      978-1912915972
      ISBN-10 1912915979
      Also in:
      Poetry

      Description

      Book Synopsis

      Tender, loving and visceral, Ovarium is a pamphlet of poems about a giant ovarian cyst. The poet charts her journey with the cyst, from diagnosis to surgery to recovery, via a landscape of scanner rooms and hospital wards.

      The poems explore the impact of illness, and the body as a site of disgust and shame but also healing and endurance. Ingham’s poems are forensic as she looks at the disorientating and sometimes patriarchal language of anatomy and medicine, and the way illness can change the relationship we have with our own bodies.

      I tried to think of you as fruit, growing
      against the sun-warm wall of my gut.

      Melon-headed, you nudged the leafy organs,
      dug out a place for yourself in the plot.

      I never guessed. I was only bloody earth
      to you, a coldframe full of light.
      - from 'Cyst'

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