No Reason

“Thanks to Jack Stewart and Cascade Books, here is a whole volume of finely crafted, fully realized poems steeped in the saving grace of the imagination. Throughout No Reason, Stewart breaks through the numbing, stultifying voice of our mass culture to uncover a deeper circuitry that links, as he writes, ‘one heart to another.’ In doing so, he reminds us again that poetry creates a sacred language, one whose intent is to change life not through embellishment but through consecration. No question, these are marvelous poems, an absolute joy to read.”


—Robert Hedin, poet, translator, editor





“Even the images chosen in Jack Stewart’s No Reason reflect the great range and depth of the poet’s journey as he joins the very large in our existence to the very small: in ‘The Annunciation,’ the poet speaks of Mary’s hair with ‘a fish scale / Hanging in a dark strand like a star’ or imagines Catherine de Medici gazing at the city of Florence where ‘the dark stiffened like brocade.’ Whether it is a biblical story, a great work of art, or watching his wife at a sewing machine, the reader feels lucky to be along for the ride in this wonderful debut collection. Jack Stewart’s No Reason gives us a true sense of hope at a time when we need it most.”


—Sally Bliumis-Dunn, author of Echolocation