Muted Red, by Gabriella Fryer

Poetry, chapbook, 32 pages, from Bottlecap Features.

Muted Red is a collection of poems in three parts honoring the choices we make and the half-lives that haunt us. These poems, grounded in the colors of the domestic and natural world, attempt to capture the brief, elusive, heartbreaking, and powerful moments where a life is made and unmade. The moments that keep us wondering: what would life be like if…?

This chapbook is also deeply rooted in the experiences of women– mothers and their daughters. Inspired by events in the poet’s life, as well as fictional characters in literature, art, and film, these poems attempt to capture the many shades of motherhood and daughterhood– its lives, deaths, and ghosts– its moments of choice. Ultimately, Muted Red insists that to create a life, is to sacrifice a life, and leaves us wondering: what would my life be like if… I didn’t love you?

Gabriella Fryer is a writer, wife, and mother of three. Originally from the Midwest, Gabriella is enjoying life in New England while working on her MA in English at the University of Maine. She writes poetry and creative nonfiction. Muted Red is her first chapbook, and her poems can also be found in Broadside Journal and Shemom.