Mother Viper

In Mother Viper, Savannah Cooper crafts a raw, confessional exploration of some of life’s deepest and most complex emotions. Rooted in the landscapes of her Missouri upbringing, Cooper’s poems navigate the ghosts of childhood and adolescence—moments both scarring and sweet, from the grief of losing a loved one to suicide to the tangled notions of home and identity that shape us. While not all poems are set in a particular place, many reflect on those liminal spaces of youth that evolve as we do.

A significant part of Cooper’s journey is her departure from the Southern Baptist faith, which she examines with both clarity and longing. Her reflections infuse childhood memories, like baptism, with an eerie reverence, embodying the bittersweet mix of freedom and loss that comes with leaving a once-firm belief system.

The collection closes with poems that grapple with the heartbreak of losing a wanted child at 22 weeks and the difficult choice of abortion. These powerful pieces reveal a complex mix of sorrow, relief, guilt, and acceptance, tracing a path from loss to resilience. Mother Viper ultimately presents a journey through grief and transformation, leading to a life that, while forever changed, finds its own version of peace and fulfillment.