Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Unfolded

the origami folding man
sits comfortably in his room
watching the days as they
unfold before his eyes and
chooses which ones to live,
which ones to get by,

this is the day we meet:
you fold me a falling star
too fast I can't make a wish.
this is the day we part:
you fold me a dragon fly
and leave tied to its wings.

I stand behind and die.

21 comments:

  1. I love the whole notion of an origami man, and the way you expand on that idea in the second stanza. It's too bad that so many meetings end in goodbyes.

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  2. Anonymous2/11/2014

    I once posted a pen called Origami, Kenia. Yours is terrifying in its beauty. ~

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  3. oh the image and magic of folding dreams and reality... so sad the ability to also folding the disappearance... and that last line really made me sad.

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  4. Anonymous2/11/2014

    I liked the fague relationship that exists in here. One is not sure what itreally is. >KB

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  5. When someone dies..instead of folding i was once told..it is like a million mail boxes..opening up into yet
    another one...
    But to close one.. i guess..
    is a chance to start another..
    instead of folding back..
    to same.. instead..
    of
    other.

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  6. This raises so many questions - there is mystery in this unknowable man. The simple form and presentation work - do not interfere with the ideas - and there is no more to be said. Thank you for sharing.

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  7. This is lovely, full of nuance and gorgeous imagery... the origami folding man....that line itself is a poem.

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  8. Origami man folding too fast and unfolding too fast too ...and the paper maiden he left behind. Thank God we're not made of paper--or is it that we have 9 lives?

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  9. "you fold me a falling star
    too fast I can't make a wish"
    lyrical, lovely

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  10. Anonymous2/11/2014

    this is gorgeous, the concluding three lines took my breath away especially

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  11. Yes, so many questions. A mysterious and elegant write.

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  12. So much at stake in those folds, the notion that he has so much delicate power in his deft fingers ... mysterious and I can't get over the day we meet and the day we say goodbye. Beautiful, fleeting, and I felt it.

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  13. Anonymous2/11/2014

    Marvelously Expressed. So Imaginative!

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  14. very lovely:-) such a sense of desperation in the opposition of stillness and motion, of being the still center left behind while all else moves, falls and flies, too fast and away ...

    for me, the music of the second stanza and the last line really confirms this poem's heartbeat -- parallel structure, alliteration, half-rhyme -- and the final (and only full) rhyme on "fly / die" (what better word for coming to an end than "die"?) rather brilliantly underlines the speaker's stasis by folding the sound back up into the poem, rather than letting it flee off the page ... and -- heartbreakingly -- the rhyme emphasizes the differing fates of the speaker and the origami man, while also connecting them ... one "flies" while the other "dies" ... (all this, really, just to say that i notice, i hug you)

    very good, indeed:-)

    .

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  15. Very nice. I saw a man today selling bonsai trees, each one trimmed so carefully. Not sure why your poem reminded me of him. Thanks for sharing.

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  16. So much said in so few lines - there is a folding and unfolding in this poem, with that most closed of vowels, the 'i' sound all the way throughout.

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  17. The unfolding of the days and choices that we make and are made for us is beautifully illustrated in this piece that tears at the heart. Such an original write!

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  18. what a sad and unexpected ending
    I thought he was tied to his chair in the corner and could be expected to remain there for you to come back for more foldings and unfoldings.
    Lovely little gem of a poem.

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  19. This took my breath away, the images and the mood changed from hopeful to dire. Very finely crafted.

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