Inventory by Stacie M. Kiner

Stacie M. Kiner’s beautiful, wise, merciful collection Inventory begins with the words of Eavan Boland about “the surface of things,” how they “barely hold…what is under them,” then deftly, subtly, and keenly mines these real and metaphorical surfaces, and as readers, we are all the richer for it. She does not expound, but rather, asks often heart-stoppingly astute questions of the largest themes of our lives: death and the dead (“where aren’t they?”), love (“a small/hard word”), loss, longing, memory, the natural and inevitable world, and how to live in it.

–Elisa Albo

There aren’t many poets who can do what Stacie M. Kiner does in her chapbook, Inventory.  She has that rare ability to write spare, crystalline poems that pack a punch. Moreover, Kiner cuts through excess “fat” with a scalpel. Her poems bleed while they sing. I confess I didn’t read these poems, rather, I tumbled through them. It’s what happens when you fall in love with her words, her exquisite language.

–Lenny DellaRocca

In these deftly crafted poems, Stacie M. Kiner performs a raw and honest inventory of objects and moments that accrete meaning. However, this work is far from dull and dutiful; with a lively curiosity and a restless desire for life, these poems carry and celebrate all the beautiful and brutal moments that together make a life.

–Emma Bolden

“When your body/decides it wants/its own words” is a perfect summation of Stacie M. Kiner’s poems. They are both visceral and lyrical at the same time, taking you on a trip into her very personal and expansive world. Her words here always seem to be the right words, the words her body wants.

–Dr. Barbra Nightingale