Drawing in Ash, is prize-winning poet Will Stone’s second collection. These compelling poems are divided into three parts, dealing with subjects such as war and genocide, and the Roman ruins of Provence - historic realities which are unpalatable and to which our current society, despite the indulgence of drawing on a vast intellectual and historical warehouse, is unable to properly determine or clarify. The poems of Provence, in particular, deal with the nature of the plethora of ancient ruins that emerge from the earth in that region, like the stubborn backbones of some pre-historic creature, and their peculiar poetic significance for us today. These poems come from a real existential engagement and follow the old dictum that a poet must respond to his time, how things are now, whilst not letting history off the hook.