Once in the West

Intense and Intimate: A Searing Collection from an Important American Poet

"Memories mercies

mostly aren't

but there were

I swear

days

veined with grace"

One of The New York Times' 10 Favorite Poetry Books of 2014 and a National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist, Once in the West is Christian Wiman's fourth collection, plumbing the depths of "suffering of primal silence" and achieving the "rockshriek of joy." Readers will recognize Wiman's sharp characterizations, humor, and reverent rage, but there is something new here, too: moving love poems to his wife, tender glimpses of his children, and amid the onslaughts of illness and fear and failures, "a trace / of peace."

Wiman's multifaceted poems are at once spiritual and secular, metaphysical and realistic, provocative and generous. With wry humor and intelligent grief, Once in the West proves why Wiman is considered one of our country's most important contemporary poets.