The main theme of this book is women. 'Mother and Daughter', the core sequence of six poems, recreates the life of my grandmother and the first thirty years of my mother's life, drawing on information my mother gave me. It shows how domination by parents, husband and society restricted a great many women at the end of the nineteenth century and into the twentieth century, leaving them dissatisfied and unfulfilled. The poems also show how this legacy is handed down the generations. Here is the last part of 'The Loser', the main poem about my grandmother, Leah:

At last husband, children,
substantial house were notched up
but resentment found cracks.
In the kitchen Leah stirred sauces,
bitter that her husband's sister,
'the duchess', paid state visits
and took over the marriage bed.
She watched him hug
card-playing brothers,
counted his gifts to cousins
and the pittance he put
in her purse, railed
at his robbery of his children.
Sick of constricting routine,
Maurice craved evenings at operettas,
ignored the clatter of complaints.
Cracks became fissures.

When Leah found he'd wrenched free,
unbuttoned for a young girl,
she knew the stain
would never wash out. The family
picked over the disgrace
and 'the duchess' pronounced
the mistress 'Leah's fault.'
Then they locked the secret up.