FARMINGTON - On May 7, poet Wesley McNair will read his poetry at the University of Maine at Farmington for the Humanities spring reception. His reading will take place at noon in the lobby of the Education Center. The public is cordially invited.

In his presentation, McNair will focus on personal poems about his hardscrabble childhood and the obstacles he faced afterward, discussing through them how he became a poet.

A professor emeritus and writer in residence at UMF, McNair recently read his poems at the Library of Congress and was selected for a United States Artist Fellowship as one of “America’s finest living artists.”

He has won numerous awards for his work, including Guggenheim, Rockefeller and NEA fellowships, poetry prizes from Poetry, Poetry Northwest and Yankee magazines, the Robert Frost and Jane Kenyon Awards, and the Sarah Josepha Hale Medal.

He has authored and edited 18 books, including two forthcoming volumes, Lovers of the Lost: New and Selected Poems, and The Words I Chose, A Memoir of Family and Poetry.

A professor emeritus and writer in residence at UMF, McNair recently read his poems at the Library of Congress and was selected for a United States Artist Fellowship as one of “America’s finest living artists.”

He has won numerous awards for his work, including Guggenheim, Rockefeller and NEA fellowships, poetry prizes from Poetry, Poetry Northwest and Yankee magazines, the Robert Frost and Jane Kenyon Awards, and the Sarah Josepha Hale Medal.

He has authored and edited 18 books, including two forthcoming volumes, Lovers of the Lost: New and Selected Poems, and The Words I Chose, A Memoir of Family and Poetry.