He Folds Paper into Birds

He keeps his hands safe and sound
By folding endless paper cranes,
And in his silent flight of hands he has found
That practiced motions plant gentle kisses on the brain.

He puts together puzzles and then puts them back in their box,
Keeping them intact—their jigsaws locked.
How else will he know what the picture looked like?
Leaving remainders as reminders and knowing are alike.

And he dreams in dreamwhite paper worlds
Made up of pure white paper creased;
Then marked and smeared and dirtied by
His own head’s leak and his fingertips' grease.
And his lines are the lines
On the face of the land
That he has scarred with
All the wanderings of his left hand.

And then waking from his pillow’s soft soft haze,
He tries to forget that for a brief moment—
In his world—
There was no difference between a map and a maze.

He folds paper into birds
That I
Unfolded
One-by-one
One White Night;
And even though all their creases were right,
Their order was lost—
A doomed migration flight.