Isla

By susan serafin jess

Isla (EYE-la): a woman's name derived from the word for island in the land of my maternal ancestors, Scotland. Leaving the world of work, plus living alone, with only cats for company, is a little like moving to an unpopulated island, occasionally coming ashore. For a writer that's not a bad thing, the transition from reading essays written by sixty students every semester to now having nothing but time for my own writing. I thought I would write on sunny days, when I have better energy. In Michigan, that would result in very few poems, so I wrote every day, cloudy or bright, during an ice storm and a tornado warning. These selected poems travel from the present to the past, from the quandary of cooking for one without wasting food to a standoff with my mother over finishing a glass of milk. The mood swings from fear of fascism, spiders, and mall shootings, to joy: a villanelle for my daughter's birthday, my glowing skin and strange cravings when I was pregnant with my son. Call it a diary of the first year on a quiet island.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0D4QQ37Q2
• ISBN13: 9798325956584
• Release Date: May 2024
• Publisher: Independently Published
• Length: 104 Pages
• Weight: 0.33 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.2" x 6.0" x 9.0"