A MOTHER who composed poetry to help deal with her teenage daughter’s leukaemia is thrilled to learn some of her work will soon be published.

Sally Cole, now a grandmother-of-three, threw herself into writing poetry when her daughter was diagnosed with the life-threatening condition as a teenager.

Thankfully, Sally’s now grown-up daughter fought back to fitness and she’s preparing for her wedding later this year.

Her mum’s verse, simply titled ‘Wareham’ will be published in a compilation of poetry from across the UK in a book by United Press in the spring.

Sally, aged 57, of Bells Orchard Lane, Wareham, sent in the poem about her home town, after reading about the competition in the Echo’s sister publication the Swanage & Wareham Advertiser.

She explained: “Writing poetry has been a passion of mine for quite a number of years. It really took off when my daughter was very, very ill as a teenager. I found that for me writing poetry was an outlet and helped with the way I was feeling at that time.

“I’d written one or two before that, but that period, when I had given up work to look after her, was when I threw myself into it.”

After the publishing company gave Sally the good news about her Wareham poem they contacted her again to ask if she could submit more of her work.

“I was asked to submit 12-15 more pieces for a separate Top Ten 2014 Book of Poetry,” she said. “My work has been selected to be published in that book too.”

The first book will be available in the spring, while the Top Ten edition will be published later in the summer.