My brother running

by Wesley McNair

Like the best of our "regional" poets, from Frost to Millay, Wesley McNair both roots his language in the particulars of place and sees beyond these particulars to create poetry that is at once universal and wholly accessible. In My Brother Running, McNair draws his inspiration from such seemingly commonplace fixtures as a local eccentric, a neighbor's dog, or a small-town Maine landscape, investing them with a mystery and stature beyond the reach of everyday experience. But the centerpiece of the book is the extended, thirteen-part title poem, a memorial to a brother dead too soon and for reasons that can never be reconciled: "... this oblivious man/with sweat opening at the center of his shirt, oh/my brother running too fast down the road to his death." Haunting, elegiac, and deeply affecting, "My Brother Running"- and this brilliant new collection as a whole - places Wesley McNair in the front rank of contemporary American poets.