At once captivating and poetic storytelling and a reflection on personal history and coming of age, What the River Was is a collection of poems that gives us a chance to pause and to consider the beauty of the world around us, the gravity of small things, and the quiet moments of our everday lives. At the same time, it asks us to examine the irony of the moments when our awe and appreciation for the environment are overshadowed by overconsumption and inevitably, destruction.

By incorporating both original and found poetry, poetry that pulls words and phrases from existing texts and transforms them into something new, What the River Was invites us to cross into a world of McIver’s creation, a world entirely his own and yet familiar enough to call ours as well.