Lye: Poems - Paperback

Lye poetically and thematically follows the ingredients of soap making-ash, water, and oil-to explore how one might wash their hands of a messy and traumatic past. If ash represents the frail damage after fire has its way, and if water represents the emotional response thereafter, then these elements would combine only to create lye: a stinging, caustic compound that reminds too much of the original flame. Yet this is exactly how generational trauma continues-a cycle of burning and burning.

It would seem the final and often-missing ingredient to transform lye into something cleansing is nothing but oil: softness and levity. How might we caress such a soothing balm onto our rawest wounds? How might we turn the endless cycle of reactivity into something new, fresh, and fragrant? Lye doesn't balk in its offering of candor, poetry, and memory as it suggests its answer to these important questions.