Early Occult Memory Systems of the Lower Midwest: Poems

A much-lauded late-bloomer, B.H. Fairchild imbues his amiable formal verse with Hollywood-caliber style, sentiment and (mainly) good cheer in Early Occult Memory Systems of the Lower Midwest. Following the runaway success of his 1997 Alice James book, The Art of the Lathe, this third collection probes deeper into the bleak beauty of the Midwest in the 1950s, and fans of Fairchild's comforting excursions to the familiar isolated territory of machinists won't be disappointed. If the poet's younger self found ""Dvorak's New World... made me/ swallow hard and turn my face away because, well,/ it was beautiful, a word I wasn't easy with,"" these memory systems yield a sharp-eyed and excited collection of curiosities that work in and beyond the heartland.