Kelly Mogk is a teacher of young writers and a teaching consultant with the National Writing Project (NWP). Through her work with NWP, she has served as a facilitator of learning in literacy for area students and educators since 2010. She holds a Bachelor of Interdisciplinary Studies from the University of North Texas and has recently completed the Master of Liberal Studies program at SMU, where she focused on cultivating her craft as a writer. Kelly’s love of the written word crosses multiple genres, and as such her work has found a home in both fiction and nonfiction publications. When she isn’t teaching or writing, Kelly enjoys spending time with her family, traveling with her husband, and tinkering with photography.
poetry
Origami
Kelly Mogk, Southern Methodist University
i.
memory is a paper thin thing—
curls over on itself,
end searching end.
flattened, a crisp creased edge becomes
a sharp horizon of
possibilities.
did I love you?
were we kind?
your hair was short and dark
when we met; your hair was
long and light.
folded again, moments become
novas reborn, lighting up
long forgotten secrets.
tuck those away, bend the memory
into something new,
swan or crane or star—
memory in bloom.
ii.
if the blank sheet becomes so
wrinkled
crumpled
and torn
that something entirely new rises from
the rubble,
you are almost there.
iii.
how, for hours, my young son sat
folded over his creations,
a small god giving and taking life
at will, on a whim, bent to
his imagination, succumbing to
his frustrations.
with a blank sheet,
he made the world.
iv.
paper thin moments
bloom and die and reappear:
an ouroboros mind.
Copyright © 2018 by Association of Graduate Liberal Studies Programs