Partially Kept

by Martha Ronk

In Partially Kept, Ronk's elegiac and lyrical poetry responds to a world marked by transience and loss. Quotations by 17th century essayist Sir Thomas Browne highlight historical shifts in language, creating intertextual poems that consider the botanical world, the art of photography, and philosophy. Ronk's attention to rhetoric and representation speak to the shifting temporality between one thing and another, between one mind and another.

Genres: Poetry

74 pages, Paperback

First published April 10, 2012

Reviews

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most of these poems were single sentences. At most, the poems were 2 sentences, with maybe 1 or 2 exceptions. Interesting to see how that is done, and why.

[Cee Spind · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'd feel it more if I had previously read browne's essays...

[Mandie Hines · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every author and poet teaches the reader how to consume their work. At first, I found Martha's poems hard to ingest, perhaps because there was a glimmer of personal things tucked into the lines and I like to dive into emotion. But these poems keep you at arm's length from the personal. It took me several poems to understand how Martha's words were telling me to absorb them. But then it clicked. You have to breathe in the poems, let them linger on the tongue before taking them in, like savoring wine. And then the images and the beauty of the words began to coalesce, and the heartbeat of the poems became clearer.

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 4 out of 5]

After reading Transfer of Qualities, my favorite poetry from the National Book Award list, I was happy to see this book of poetry from Martha Ronk at the library. The poems are in three sections - the first are poems after Sir Thomas Browne's essay The Garden of Cyrus, and are all about plants and gardens. Each one contains an excerpt (even just a word) of Browne, and while beautiful, this isn't really my favorite style of poems. The second section is all paragraph poems, called "No Sky." The third section, and my favorite, is "August."

My favorite poem is "Reading her thinking," and I wish I could find it online to link to, but since I can't, please enjoy a bit of Martha Ronk reading her poetry from this volume and an earlier one.

[Liam Malone · Rating 4 out of 5]

It just so happens that I am in the midst of reading difficult to understand poetry. I read other works by Ronk and felt closer to them than I do Partially Kept. I liked the self containment and idea of what is may not be what actually is. The use of windows, mirrors, light, space and sky all show how we can and cannot see reality. It certainly makes me think. I will re-read this one day in the next year or two. Then see if I need to edit this short review.