Talking in the Dark
Talking in the Dark, Wesley McNair's fifth collection, contains work awarded the annual first prize from Yankee, included in thePushcart Prize anthology, and chosen for The Best American Poetry, 1999. In the book, one of New England's most respected poets brings us the inhabitants of his region as they struggle to contend with life's darknesses—housewives in night school; a tractor-tinkering stepfather who rescues an outdated encyclopedia from the town dump; a boy at bedtime who, entranced by a woman's voice on a slowing turning phonograph, listens "to her fall/fast asleep/with the needle /at her throat." How McNair's characters talk about their difficulties—or why they can't—is central to this volume, as are meditations in which the poet speaks directly to the reader about the trials and affirmations of human experience. Whether homages to "Old Cadillacs" or reflections on "Why We Need Poetry," these poems demonstrate McNair's ability to tell a life in a line and to disclose the knowledge of the heart.
—Excerpt from the David R.Godine catalogue
"In a time when the neo-formalists and a linguistic avant-garde make competing claims on the soul of American poetry, poets who strive to be accessible and complex are in increasingly short supply. One of them is Wesley McNair...Talking in the Dark [is] one of the year's most significant poetic achievements."
—Minneapolis Star Tribune
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