Blood, Water and Stone

"I've been thinking lately of poetry as the world's oldest recording device. And in this context, Richard Stimac's astonishing new collection, Blood, Water and Stone, shines forth brilliantly. You might call this book the Myth of the Midwest, for any mention of Cairo has to include our Cairo. And being St Louisans, we have little tolerance for BS-and Stimac doesn't give us any. At the outset, we're warned of the instability of river country. And a little later we hear, "I don't live in a world of metaphors." This is coming from the heart. Working through the damage that men have done, we arrive at the loving tribute of "Eucharist" and the inordinate quotidian of "Limbo." We might go all the way back to Olympia but the condition is the same: war and loss. Stimac is not quick to give easy answers, but in a poem like "Whiskey River" we can take comfort in the strength of memory. These are poems that bend toward the religious, written by someone who won't budge from his vision."

-Matthew Freeman, author of Dopamine and The Devil (Coffeetown Press 2025)