Analysis Of Discovering Kay Ryan

Ryan reminds us of the suggestive power of poetry–how it elicits and rewards the reader’s intellect, imagination, and emotions. I like to think that Ryan’s magnificently compressed poetry – along with the emergence of other new masters of the short poem like Timothy Murphy and H.L. Hix and the veteran maestri like Ted Kooser and Dick Davis – signals a return to concision and intensity.
(“Discovering Kay Ryan”)
Kay Ryan, born 1945 in California, is an exceptional author who is renowned for her work (Poets.org). Her poems may seem simple to some, but they have the power to leave an everlasting mark in your mind. It is no surprise that distinguished writers and critics, such as Dana Gioia, have complimented her writings for its “sheer intelligence” and “indeed wisdom” (“Discovering Kay Ryan”).
It is easy to recognize Ryan’s work through her unique form of writing. When studying her poems, you can see that she tends to write in short lines and prefers to use internal rime rather than end rime. In an interview she explains her reasoning behind this

Internal rime is also used in “Turtle,” but there are eight to fifteen syllables per line. In the poem, the choice of rime places emphasis on important characteristics of the character. The author rimes “four-oared” with “afford” and “lottery” with “pottery” so our attention goes to those words (2-3, 12-13). This makes us remember that the turtle is tough but fragile; she also does not place false hope into things that will likely never happen. By having more syllables per line, Ryan places importance on the turtle’s lack of power. The poem reads in a slower, more methodical pace than “Mockingbird” and has a sense of softness that the latter poem lacked. The softness reveals the turtle’s patience with her lot in life, but also seems to suggest the speaker’s pity towards the reptile’s