A Little Feral

Maria Giesbrecht’s debut poetry collection, A Little Feral, offers a fresh play on language that sculpts away societal debris and leaves the reader with something more raw and wild. In learning that threads of this poetry were written during an upbringing within a Mennonite culture, feral translated more to me beyond being rebellious, but, a holding fast to something more pure, something of an inner truth. 

Much sacrifice comes with A Little Feral. The existence of this poetry collection is proof of a life given up for the very act of writing. In an interview with People, Giesbrecht states that “a decade later, it was only through writing my poetry collection, A Little Feral, that I finally abandoned my faith and community and rediscovered my voice on my own terms.” Her definition of feral. 

Feral as in resisting indoctrination. Feral as in calling in a more ancient language, and feral as in choosing the solitary cusp of the light of the moon versus the daylight blinding hours of patriarchy.  

A poetic form that embraces the sedimentary layers of a femininity seeking release, the writer broke free from this religious upbringing through the very act of writing. 

I ache knowing that a free woman in this contemporary society is still translated as rebellious and taking a stand. We should be free in our own right, existing should not be an act of protest. 

The cover of A Little Feral, set a striking tone for me right away. The image of dozens of cream-coloured birds overtaking a living room that looks from the boxiness of the tv to be from the 80s creates a peculiar effect. The domestic space becomes slightly wild, echoing the title. The birds appear less like individual animals than a quiet invasion of emotional presence.

Given the title of the collection, it's possible the birds intentionally blur the line between doves and pigeons. A white dove is an enduring symbol of God’s presence. Noah released a dove after the Flood. It returned carrying an olive leaf, announcing that the waters of judgment had receded and creation had begun again. The dove, a covenant between God and humanity. There are many birds on the cover of A Little Feral. Divine indwelling, if doves, they could be translated as Spirit taking visible form.

The birds on the cover could also be feral pigeons. The pigeon is not usually viewed as holy because it inhabits marketplaces, rooftops, train stations… surviving through adaptation rather than purity. A feral pigeon can represent endurance, life among ruins and creation persisting despite human neglect. If the dove symbolizes heaven descending to earth, the pigeon often symbolizes heaven remaining hidden within the everyday. Perhaps deliberately ambiguous, the reality is this room is consumed by cream-coloured birds and their fallen feathers. 

I can picture the sound of that room if all of those birds took flight. Those birds attempting to lift off in such an enclosed space. My heart would race. Giesbrecht’s poetry felt this way. 

Divided into 5 parts, there is an epilogue-ish poem titled, “A little feral,” that introduces the collection. Feral, a refusal of the expected tidiness of domesticity. 

“There’s a car in my neighborhood with the bumper sticker/ a little feral and I think of how yesterday I sawed off/ two slices of watermelon and let them drip disgusting/ down my elbows. I catch myself sometimes. I forget/ to sweep the corners on purpose or run a load of laundry/ without soap. I press into the world’s chest- will it budge?...I push/ back like a palm in church. I didn’t know I loved God/ until he grated the black night into my bowl and didn’t flinch/ when I threw up a few stars.” 

The poem pulls us into a whole other understanding of relationship with Spirit, a space of the rawness of being honest with Spirit, free from indoctrination and knowing one’s place in the world. In spitting and firing up stars and ethereal matter, Spirit can accept and love all of that of ourselves. 

A Little Feral was born from a seed planted in the dark and grew into something thriving and free. 

“My methods for hiding my poetry also evolved over time. I started a secret Blogspot website when I was around 15, writing poems under a pseudonym for a handful of strangers who knew nothing about my culture or upbringing. It was a strange, bifurcated existence: by day, I was a good girl in a Mennonite dress. By night, I was a poet, hitting "publish" on a keyboard and sending my soul into the ether. No one in my family knew about my rebellion poems.”

And in the germination of that secret writing, Giesbrecht developed a creation process and relationship with language that enabled her to break the surface and grow towards the sun. 

“It felt like I had discovered a loophole. I could write my own words — words that didn't have to be approved by a minister — and no one was there to "shush" me. No one to question me or to tell me my thoughts were too loud. Too wrong. Too sinful. So I wrote them all down. When I discovered that other poets were doing the same, I felt a kinship with them. Poets like Sylvia Plath, Mary Oliver and Adrienne Rich showed me there was a way out with words.”

A way out with words…Giesbrecht’s way of survival. 

Born in Durango, Mexico, to a Mennonite family, Maria Giesbrecht found in poetry a means of survival and resistance. As she writes, it is “a safe / rebellion. A poem. / It’s the way I have survived.” Throughout her work, she interrogates the intertwined forces of religion, family, and identity. Her poetry confronts inherited beliefs while reclaiming an authentic voice shaped by memory, trauma and resilience.

Giesbrecht is a Canadian poet whose work explores the intersections of her Mexican upbringing and Mennonite heritage. Her poetry has appeared in The Literary Review of Canada, Grain, ONLY POEMS, San Pedro River Review, and numerous other publications. She is the recipient of the 2025 Jack McCarthy Book Prize, a Best of the Net nominee, and the founder of Gather, an international writing community that connects poets around the world. She currently lives in Toronto, Ontario, with her fiancée. 

More information about her work can be found at mariagiesbrecht.com.

Founded in 2004 by award-winning poet and former 82nd Airborne paratrooper Derrick C. Brown, Write Bloody Publishing emerged from a desire to bring the energy of spoken-word poetry to the printed page. Brown recognized that many of the most compelling poets in North America were captivating audiences in bars, theatres, and clubs while selling self-produced chapbooks that failed to reflect the quality of their work. Write Bloody was established to give these touring poets beautifully produced, professionally distributed books worthy of their voices.

Now a nonprofit based in Los Angeles, Write Bloody has become one of North America's leading independent poetry publishers. Over more than two decades, the press has published over 185 collections by National Poetry Slam champions, bestselling authors, TED speakers, and award-winning emerging poets. Its international imprints, Write Bloody UK and Write Bloody North in Toronto, further extend its commitment to publishing distinctive contemporary voices. A Little Feral compliments Write Bloody’s vision of authenticity and emotive tapestries. 

Feral as defined in electric literature (2026), a hashtagging momentum in retaliation of #hotgirlsummer, we arrived at #feralgirlsummer in 2022. “Feral girlhood is a state of mind accessible to anyone who claims agency over their life.” Giesbrecht weighed in on #feralgirlsummer in this article, “all I knew was that I wanted to write toward the grime, the grit, and the gall. I started posting some of my poems on my Instagram, and my DMs overflowed with folks connecting over our shared mess.” Feral as in revealing the ugliest and messiest parts of yourself to the world and letting yourself be seen. 

But, A Little Feral is more than being seen, it is about enduring. “Four women in my family know the recipe/ for continuing. It is this way: The treadmill heart/ wins in the end. I promise, love.” Despite the treachery and pain of life, living can go on. And, what resonated with me, “there is no pretty way to save yourself.” There were many moments throughout this collection that stopped me and held me in the splendor of the spry arrangement of words. 

One poem that stood out to me was “Church Pregnancy.” And, knowing the writer’s religious upbringing enchained by patriarchal dogmatism, the selection of words, Giesbrecht’s diction and descriptive language becomes more potent. 

“The pregnancy/ of a church is longer than nine months./ It grows in your eyeballs, in your ankles,/ rots the sacral center of your wonder,/ right above your belly button. The first time/ you go to sleep in a house that isn’t holy,/ the walls are not silent. They are coaxing you/ through each contraction. To be born/ again is to give birth to yourself alone.” 

That is what A Little Feral accomplishes, a birthing into another side alone, yet braided into a whole new community and tribe of feral women. 

Thank you to Maria Giesbrecht, Write Bloody Publishing and River Street Writing for a complimentary copy in request for an honest review.