Orient is the third collection from one of Western Canada’s most accomplished poets. Composed mainly of three long poems–an extended meditation on the connection between man and fish, the lament of a big-souled cowboy poet looking up from rock bottom, and a historical envisioning of an intimate relationship between a pioneer and a powerful crone–Orient leaps, sings, burrows down, and orients the reader within its rich ecosystem. The appeal of these poems lies partly in their blend of humility (the open-minded approach), in their force (the taut style, the original vision) and in an astonishing boldness. Wigmore is a “poet of place” in the best sense: “about the big picture.”

I had a job and then I didn’t

but once I spoke a tavern sermon
that came to me in darkness
and men I knew who crossed the street

who shunned me in daylight
they wept
and that’s something

— from “tavern”