The Don't Touch Garden

The Don't Touch Garden explores what it is to be adopted, both for the child and the adoptive parents, through a wide range of poetic styles and complex emotions. An absorbing account of the legacy of being an adopted child. Forthright and tender, this moving sequence reflects Foley's unflinching gaze into the mirror in a sometimes excoriating attempt to discern traces of her belonging, and to make peace with the past. Joy Howard, Poet, publisher and former Fostering Services Manager

Kate Foley is a widely published, prize-winning poet and former president of Suffolk Poetry Society. She has read in many UK and European locations. Her first collection, Soft Engineering was short listed for best first collection at Aldeburgh. Her working life has ranged from delivering babies to conserving delicate archaeological material. She became Head of English Heritage's scientific and technical research laboratories. Although she has always written poetry it wasn't until she gave up the day job that she began to publish more widely. She now lives with her wife, between Amsterdam and Suffolk, where she performs, writes, edits, leads workshops and whenever possible works with artists in other disciplines.