Alterations

Synopsis

After the loss of one of her unborn twins, poet and essayist Chelsea Biondolillo Winrock turns to a quiet collective of women who transform donated wedding dresses into burial garments for infants. Their meticulous work of unpicking seams, removing lace, and remaking fabric becomes the starting point for an essay that seeks to understand grief through the language of making.

Moving between textiles and texts, Alterations weaves together stories of seamstresses, space suits, Emily Dickinson's white dress, children's literature, and the hidden labour of mourning. Both deeply personal and formally inventive, it is a moving meditation on loss, care, memory, and the ways acts of creation can help carry the unbearable.

About the Author

Chelsea Biondolillo Winrock is an American poet, essayist, and educator. Her writing explores family, ecology, art, and grief with lyrical precision and formal experimentation. Alterations is an intimate work of nonfiction that brings together memoir, literary criticism, and cultural history.

Publisher
Astra House

Publication Date
October 7, 2025

Format
Paperback

Pages
192

Subjects
Memoir · Essays · Grief · Feminism · Literary Nonfiction

ISBN
9798893389012