http://www.loc.gov/mods/v3 http://www.loc.gov/standards/mods/v3/mods-3-2.xsd
National Animal, Derek Webster's second book of poetry, inhabits a wider public space than his acclaimed debut Mockingbird. In poems that extend beyond the biographical toward the political, Webster's quiet, sharp-eyed narrator, a man "tripping / my way forward, trying to lead my own life," watches history being erased in favor of more socially palatable ideas and comforting self-portraits. Uncompromising and substantial, National Animal explores our "civic moment" where "birds sing oblivion / estranged from all things, and meditates, in a final image-rich sequence, on our place in a science-based cosmos.