Ovarium, published by The Emma Press in 2022, is a poetry pamphlet that explores my experience of having a giant ovarian cyst. The poems move from diagnosis through to surgery and recovery. It was chosen by Poetry Book Society Pamphlet Selector Nina Mingya Powles as one of her recommendations for Autumn 2022. It has also been shortlisted for the East Anglian Book Awards 2022.
‘Joanna Ingham’s Ovarium is irresistible and intimate; this is poetry of the body at its finest. It made me look at my own body anew and the mini ecosystems that make up who we are: cells, ponds, gardens, hospitals.’
Nina Mingya Powles for the PBS
‘First and foremost, these are poems full of wonderful sounds, as well as being cinematically clear. … Each poem approaches its subject from a fresh angle. They are confident and experimental, seeking to discover through the act of creating. Ingham manages to strike the difficult balance of adding humour without undermining the weight of sorrow. The poems feel vulnerable and honest, but unashamed about the entire experience.’
Zannah Kearns in Sphinx Review
Read a review by Hilary Menos in The Friday Poem here:
thefridaypoem.com/ovarium-joanna-ingham-menos/
Ovarium is available to buy here:
https://theemmapress.com/shop/poetry/pamphlets/ovarium
Listen to me reading some poems from Ovarium here:
https://www.home-stage.co.uk/joanna-ingham
Naming Bones, published by ignitionpress in 2019, was my debut pamphlet. Poems explore new motherhood, family relationships and the natural world. It was chosen by PBS Pamphlet Selector A.B. Jackson as one of his three ‘other favourites’ for Winter 2019, and by Poetry Wales as one of their 44 Poetry Books of the Year.
‘An impressive twenty poems. Ingham’s language is so striking and exact that it feels four-dimensional. … Each poem in this pamphlet is equally precise and masterfully draws us in layer by layer, the rich and ordinary details bringing us to wider and surprising truths.’
clare e. potter in Poetry Wales
‘This collection, full of strong, clear, vivid poems, positively bulges with love. And it explores our difficulty containing it … the too-muchness of things. … She writes exquisitely of nature, including our place in it, and physical love.’
Charlotte Gann in Sphinx Review
Naming Bones is available to buy here:
Joanna Ingham 