"Provocative and tender, passionate yet wary, the highly charged poems in elen Farish's first collection testify to the complex nature of relationships ith lovers, with family and with the self. The love poems explore moments f intense exposure, and within the erotic relation seek to carve out a oice adequate to the expression of female sexuality and desire. Within his framework, the body itself becomes a rich and compelling site of inquiry. Posted throughout the collection like sentinels, poems on the death of the father draw the poet back home where grief mingles with surprising moments of grace or redemption. But whether the encounter oncerns sudden loss or sudden blessing, constant throughout is a warm and oldly embodied lyric 'I' voice generously inviting the reader in. Poised at life's id-point, these haunting, haunted poems negotiate their emotional freight n carefully crafted forms which mediate between exposure and uardedness. Expertly charting the geographies of sex and love, the istories of childhood and grief, Intimates introduces a new poet of riginality, honesty and singular power.