{"product_id":"breakwater-rock-bruce-lawder-9781950475421","title":"Breakwater Rock","description":"\u003cp\u003eFor years I had wanted to write a book of poems that would bring together, geographically, the two halves of my life, first in the United States, where I grew up, and then in Europe, where I now live. I was not sure how I would find the diversity of voices for such a project, but then one day something totally unexpected occurred. As I was being wheeled into the operating room of a Swiss hospital, a few words suddenly went through my head: \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eExile, \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eyour former island, \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003elets you go.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI have always been curious what I would think before losing consciousness, and when I came to, this time, after my knee operation, the strange words were still there, still in the form of a stanza, and soon other words began to appear as well. I realized at once what was happening, and asked my wife for a piece of paper and something firm to write against. And so began \"The Turning of the Tide\", a poem I wrote \"upside down\" on my back from my bed in the hospital.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe poem turned out to be an announcement, to myself, of a homecoming, both in space and in time, to the town where I had come of age during what is still called the Vietnam War, though it was not ever officially a war. I had scheduled the operation early enough so that I would be able to walk once more along the edge of the Sound where, as a young man, I had wandered alone and often at night trying to come to terms with the world before me. As a boy I had learned that a word, like a country, has a history of its own, and I had mistakenly derived \"exile\" from the French of \"ex\" and \"île\" and falsely arrived at my \"former island\"; and now, freed of falsehood, here was the word again, in a new yet familiar context. I realized that I had a start on the book that would bring the two continents - the two tectonic plates of my life - back together, in space and time. Other poems began to appear, some even before I had returned to my old hometown, stepping stones of a sort, and what I now had to do, I saw, was to put the separate stones together, to make, in other words, a breakwater rock of my own, something open to everyone, protective and inviting, entrance and exit at once.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Bruce Lawder\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 1950475425\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781950475421\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Homestead Lighthouse Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 05\/15\/2025\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 82\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.27lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.20d","brand":"Bruce Lawder","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":47135442436351,"sku":"9781950475421","price":19.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_4bbbd329-88cb-443e-af4c-ef33f260f22f.jpg?v=1755010168","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/breakwater-rock-bruce-lawder-9781950475421","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}