In the Night Field

Synopsis

"All fire and surprise, sadness and forgiveness...I could never say enough about the beauty of this work." —Jericho Brown

"Cameron's poems are wonderfully full, energetic, and ardent." —Vijay Seshadri

"McGill skillfully navigates the mysteries of relationship, memory, and regret as the best poets do." —Dorianne Laux

"It’s been a long time since I have heard the 'god of small thunder' echo so powerfully in a collection." —Campbell McGrath

Cameron McGill’s debut collection of poetry, In the Night Field, spotlights the effects of memory: its startling artistry, varied discontents, and casual fallibility. These poems chart the complex relationship between mental health and place; the difficult paths home can be lonely and circuitous, the emotional coordinates we map along the way a reminder of those intimate regions that hold and haunt us. These can be isolating passages, but are just as often fertile: “I walk further each day toward the strange / austerity my heart makes of reason.” Between the attentive, persistent self and the longed-for, absent other arises a fragmented conversation, an exchange that’s in a constant state of arrival. As McGill shows us, memories are a corrective, carrying back to us occasions for instruction, reconciliation, or in those astonishing flashes of clarity, what again hopes to be loved.