[1] According to United States Artists, Wesley McNair's poetry often deals with "the struggles of the economic misfits of his native New England, often with humor and through the use of telling details.

"[2] In his memoir The Words I Chose, McNair refers to the region of his poetry as "a place of farmers under threat, ethnic shop workers, traders, and misfits at the margins" and his exploration of "their American dreams, failures, self-doubts, and restlessness.

The core characters of the book, derived from his mother and her siblings, are part of a forgotten American generation who grew up in the poverty and hardship of the Dust Bowl period.

And there I was alongside, watching them do it.”[5] In Dwellers in the House of the Lord (Godine, 2020), he writes about rural Virginia, where his sister Aimee struggles with a failing marriage to Mike, the owner of an off-the-grid gun shop.

The book-length narrative poem explores his family's immigrant origins and links Aimee's story with the ugly politics of the Trump era.

“Throughout the trilogy is a growing apprehension that something has gone deeply wrong with the nation’s sense of itself over the past 40 years,” McNair remarks in his Rustica interview.

[6] The Los Angeles Review of Books wrote: “At 81, Wesley McNair is writing the best poetry of his life—poetry uniquely capable of, and interested in, addressing our larger moment.”[7] Writing in The National Review, Nick Ripatrazone concluded: “McNair’s poems are just sharp enough to open our eyes anew—and just smooth enough for us to think such wisdom arrived by grace alone.

His work is melodic without being singsong; it is both sanguine and realistic.”[8] Foreword Reviews wrote: “Not all poets are storytellers, not even close, but all of them wish they were, wish they had a better understanding of how words and images bind spells.”[9] McNair's eleven volumes of poetry, inspired by region, American popular culture, and the broad human experience, include a wide range of meditations, lyrics and narratives.

According to Meg Haskell in the Bangor Daily News on September 30, 2017, his goal was "to demystify poetry and make it more accessible to all Maine people."

In the same journal in the fall of 2002, Maxine Kumin, the United States Poet Laureate from 1981 to 1982, called McNair "a master craftsman, with a remarkable ear."

Taking up approximately 100 linear feet in the college library's Special Collections, the Wesley McNair Papers include: In 2010, Colby College's Special Collections Librarian Patricia Burdick launched an innovative new Web site that utilizes McNair's poetry to increase understanding of and appreciation for the making of poetry.