Radioland

Poetry. Lesley Wheeler's new volume of poems, RADIOLAND, spellbinds with the gorgeous sounds of its poetry: 'Drag belly over gravel on a cave-lip / into the TV and sleep in it, ' one poem opens. Note the insouciant forging of ancient and quotidian scenes, the modulation of vowels punctuated by v's: I'm hooked! Wheeler is, among other glories, a consummate formalist, but she is also profound in her exploration of the governing trope of this collection: the deeply human struggles in which families engage to be receptors and transmitters of love (the crisis brought to a head by the unforgiven father's death). In RADIOLAND's disturbed emissions and reception, we cannot always tell what's '[s]ignal and noise, ' but at the borderland to the absolute, Wheeler is surefooted in her exploration of love's echoing 'parley' in the world.--Cynthia Hogue