"Keeping things whole": a poem review

Review of the poem "Keeping things whole"

Mark Strand’s “Keeping Things Whole” is a poem of paradox. With its three stanzas, an “I” persona speaks as one that “keeps things whole”. That “I” may be a something, a someone, a somewhere, or basically anything. What is clear, however, is that the “I” can keep and does keep things whole through rather odd approaches.

The initial paradox in the short poem is the line “In a field, I am the absence of field.” The first line conveys the presence of a field, whereas in the second line, the “I” claims that he/she/it is the nonexistence of a field. In the end of the first stanza is another paradox: “Wherever I am, I am what is missing.”

How could it be possible that the persona is present and yet be the absence? It is worth considering the next stanza. It says that “When I walk, I part the air… the air moves in to fill the spaces where my body’s been.” In saying this, the persona seems to be a character or an object that comes, passes, and leaves an impression behind.

The last stanza says “We all have reasons for moving. I move to keep things whole.” Using this indication, we can consider that the persona is a character that continuously moves to inspire. The “I” persona most possibly represents a trial or a hardship. It keeps coming, it “parts the air” yet the air also “moves in to fill the space where my body’s been.” This is how experiences of hardships go through us: they come, they go, and yet after their passing the air full of memories and new wisdom moves in to replace that space. Without privations, we feel lacking because we don’t know what we can (and cannot) do. This is because we human beings are made to search for perfection and wholeness. Trials test our character and prove what we really are made of. They prove that what is important is not what we lack but what we have.

The persona may also stand for the constant need of us humans for change. As the earth is made to undergo processes and change over years and centuries past, so do we beings change for seconds, days, or years of living. This is related to our quest for perfection; we persistently improve ourselves through change and keep ourselves whole in the process. This outlook is similar to Darwin’s theory about “survival of the fittest.” We creatures must relentlessly adapt to the environment to “keep ourselves whole” or to survive.

Through physical activity, the persona is connected to the world for they are both incessantly changing. Changes, however, take the place of the past which are changed. From this inspection, we can also conjecture that perhaps the persona is one who lacks personal identity or feels he has never found his place in the universe. That is why he is forced to keep moving. Stopping would mean breakage or death. The persona may be feeling that he has never been accepted or loved that’s why he keeps drifting from places to places to keep his hope (and ego) whole.

On the other hand, it is also possible that this same persona is actually one that has found his true identity as said by the line “We all have reasons for moving, I move to keep things whole.” The persona may be one who has realized that his destiny is never to settle and take part but to wander ceaselessly and keep other things whole.