When Sam Ray was killed at nineteen in an accident, his father began writing poetry dedicated to his memory. Sam's Book is a collection of these elegies and other poems written during Sam's lifetime. "How should I mourn?" David Ray asks. By recalling poignant events from the past he transcends his grief. He remembers Sam's first bath, a "holy/Rite"; tying the shoelaces of the "little man"; traveling to Greece, where Sam is "the first.../to see the holy moon." With painful wit and regret he summons up the image of his son's blue Toyota, fastidiously transformed by Sam and his girlfriend into a "love nest." Ray muses on what he taught Sam and what Sam taught him.
""Heartbreaking poems... praise the cycle of life, acknowledge the power of death and express the love of a father for his son.""
Andy Brumer
""I admire Ray's honesty and directness, but that he should also be able to make poems out of his grief...is a tribute to the steely-nerved artist in him... I will stand out among books of contemporary poetry.""
