TOMMY by Donna Isaac

Print-on-demand chapbook.
ISBN: 978-1-890193-13-3
32 pages
5 3/4" x 8 1/4"
Text set in RTF Albertan Pro, a digital type designed by Jim Rimmer.

Now, now I walk in, unafraid,
until chin-high, arms outstretched,
I lean back and float upon
a sea of stars, drifting, pulled by
constellations, currents, into cold spots
where finny fire flicks at my legs
and half-moon shells lie beneath me,
beneath the clouds, roiled,
rain moving kelp in ribbons.

from 'Bay' in Tommy by Donna Isaac (Red Dragonfly Press, 2009)

"Tommy," an elegiac chapbook, celebrates and mourns a younger brother who
died young. Using varied poetic forms, landscape, and memory, poet Donna
Isaac takes the readers through a personal and yet universal journey of
grief and acceptance. Each poem represents a step that a sister must take
to understand that both suffering and joy are necessary for an authentic
life. Using imagery of the natural world as touchstones in many of the
poems, Isaac connects the beauty of beach, mountain, and flower with the
beauty that was her brother.