Topaz examines the experiences of a Japanese American family separated and incarcerated in World War II prison camps and considers how this incarceration affected the family. Moreover, this collection delves into the lasting impact of this imprisonment on future generations. The speaker of these poems seeks to understand his identity—as son, father, and husband—as it intertwines with the past and present.

Brian Komei Dempster is an award-winning poet, editor, and teacher. His volumes of poetry, Seize (Four Way Books, 2020) and Topaz (Four Way Books, 2013), have received several honors, including the Julie Suk Award, an NCPA Gold Award in Poetry, and a Human Relations Indie Book Silver Winner award. He is the editor of From Our Side of the Fence: Growing Up in America’s Concentration Camps (Kearny Street Workshop, 2001), which received a Nisei Voices Award from the National Japanese American Historical Society, and Making Home from War: Stories of Japanese American Exile and Resettlement (Heyday, 2011). Dempster is a professor of rhetoric and language and Co-Director of the Center for Research, Artistic, and Scholarly Excellence at the University of San Francisco, where he was a recipient of the Dean’s Scholar Award and Distinguished Teaching Award. In addition, he teaches for the Colrain Poetry Manuscript Conference. He was a 2023 Guggenheim Fellow in Poetry.