“In her fourth collection of poems, Church Ladies (Fernwood Press 2023), Renee Emerson spins together a heritage of women from church history. These poems grieve, celebrate, and center women who have been swept aside from our cultural memory — sometimes behind the shadow of a man, sometimes under vows of poverty, sometimes beneath ash. Church Ladies lifts a curtain on church history and carefully examines the women who carried incredible weights of charity, worship, and love to the altar of sacrifice. Through these poems, interspersed with personas of historical figures and familiar faces from American Christianity, Emerson finds holiness in a womanhood at once overflowing with both tenderness and wildness. These poems are burnt offerings that leave the reader at once tattered and made whole.”
Ian C. Williams, The Atticus Review
You can read the rest of this lovely review at The Atticus Review.
Renee Emerson 
thoughts?