The Rest of the Way

Tom Laughlin takes us outdoors in poetry that brims with the natural elements-we are immersed in New England landscapes with a town green a mistress moon snowy woods lined with elfin ski tracks and swimmable water in every form which conjures joy and jazz a Great White and a night-time pipe-smoking fisherman. Haunting the collection like a familiar ache is a wounded and wounding father. Death and tragedy slip in around tender stories of swimming a grasshopper to safety climbing pencil pines and James Wright's hammock. Laughlin's collection invites us to[bob] in a universe of stars as we ponder 'the rest of the way.'--Mary Buchinger author of e i n f ü h l u n g/in feeling and president of the New England Poetry Club