Hymns and Essays

Poetry. The majority of the poems in HYMNS AND ESSAYS, Stuart Krimko's third collection, employ almost sickly sequences of rhyming couplets as they dance through theological meditations, rage-filled rants on contemporary culture, and clear-eyed appreciation for a dizzying array of flora and fauna. This formal choice is so ridden with nostalgia for the lost science of the 18th century that its deadened emotional impact has been turned inside-out; as a result, the poems become objects capable of blunt force or sweet, masochistic cutting. True to its title, there is a fusion of strong music (however hamfisted) and exploration of broad thematic concerns, including natural morphology and the pleasures and disappointments of monotheism.