The Unfolding
I am not one to rush headlong
into ceremony as I do into love.
When I find the small swan
years later, folded from paper
of pale blue, I pause. Study
each careful crease your fingers
once made. Remember. This
tender gesture, the miracle
of geometry. How a square can be shape-
shifted, become something other,
something sudden & bent, almost
beautiful. How it sat there, quiet & flightless
in the palm of my hand. The lake
our only witness, the air thick
with questions, each knowing cloud. I am ready
now. Anoint myself priestess & begin. I unfold
what was folded, silent & slow. Undo & loosen
the brief bird that had been, soothe & smooth
with my fingertips four corners of sky.
*
Robin Turner has recent work in One (Jacar Press), Heron Tree, West Trestle Review, Literary Mama, and Autumn Sky Poetry Daily, and a chapbook, bindweed & crow poison, with Porkbelly Press. A longtime community teaching artist in Dallas, she recently moved to the Pineywoods of East Texas. She works with teen writers online.
I really like this one!