Marvels of the Invisible: Poems

by Jenny Molberg

Winner of the Berkshire Prize, Tupelo Press's First/Second Book Award, selected by Jeffrey Harrison In this award-winning debut collection, the smallest things of the world bear enormous emotive weight. For Jenny Molberg, the invisible and barely visible are forms of memory, articulations of our place in the cosmos. Parsing the intersections between science and personal history, and contemplating archival letters from 17th- and 18th-century scientists along with new studies in biological phenomena, Molberg's poems examine complexities of relationships with parents and the faultiness of certainty about earthly permanence. In the title poem, a child begins by looking at an ant through a microscope, and later, as a husband and father, with the same discerning eye he recognizes the cancer in his wife's breast. Marvels of the Invisible sounds the depths of both grief and amazement, two kinds of awareness inseparably entwined.

Genres: Poetry

92 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2017

Reviews

[Sidney · Rating 5 out of 5]

She will win a Pulitzer one day. Just wanted to go on record saying that and hope I'm the first.

[L. A. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gorgeous book with searing imagery. So many interesting meditations on what it means to be a child and a parent, how we age and what stays with us. These poems work with a logic that is unique unto themselves and every poem is incredibly strong. “Narrative” is a personal favorite.

[Jessica]

A gorgeous collection in which meaning is revealed, and revealed, and revealed. Like the matryoshka dolls in one poem, the invisible interior is just as important as the more easily described surface. Molberg is a magnificent poet.

[Maggie McMichael · Rating 5 out of 5]

AMAZING BEAUTIFUL HAUNTING POETRY

[Callista · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book about intersections--about the connections between the past and the present, between loved ones, between what we need and what we want. The collection uses history, especially historical science, as a way to interrogate the self, and by extension, what it means to be human now. Lovely, evocative images and delicate, precise lines. Not to be missed.

[Anatoly Molotkov · Rating 5 out of 5]

"We find the dead/ beneath the rheumy crystals of quartz./ The moon pulls the ocean to a curl and settles down,/ fat and orange, beside me. We discover/each molecule, passing through and out of me,/ that has already known many others." A passionate, dark, mysterious and very human collection from Jenny Molberg.

[Hannah Warren · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jenny Molberg's collection is an extended question, a narrative that asks the reader to explore their own transformations, ideas, and identities. Dazzling language!

"The oldest scientist asks, If we are all
creatures of transformation,
if we are never quite the same,
what are we
when we arrive at the moment of death?"

[Kate Gaskin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Marvels of the Invisible charts wondrous territory. These poems peel back layers of scientific phenomena, rich landscapes, and familial bonds in order to arrive at the heart of what it is to be human. Molberg writes with empathy and beautiful precision.

[Anji M · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first poem… THE FIRST POEM, I read it on Twitter and promptly ordered the book. It is an opus, a beauty, pain and life. I cry every time I read it. I loved the whole book, and will be a fan of her work from here on.

[hh · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5-4