Paper Dolls

[moot]

Paper dolls,
cut to please.
In perfect rows,
sharply creased.

Ruin marks the passage of time.
All good things fray,
The end never lies.
Paper dolls fall into decay.

Like a scythe,
the clocks hands reave,
Paper doll heads tumble.
Death;
offers reprieve,
to infinities slow shuffle.

Paper dolls stare,
Cut out eyes that never blink.
Paper dolls do not care.
Paper dolls do not think.

Paper dolls,
cut to please.
In perfect rows,
sharply creased.

Ruin marks the passage of time.
All good things fray,
The end never lies.
Paper dolls fall into decay.

Like a scythe,
the clocks hands reave,                       -I like the use of the word reave here.
Paper doll heads tumble.
Death;                                                -I'd eliminate this semi-colon
offers reprieve,                                     and this comma
to infinities slow shuffle.                      

Paper dolls stare,
Cut out eyes that never blink.               -not sure about "cut out", but I understand the metaphor concerning blindness.
Paper dolls do not care.
Paper dolls do not think.


Interesting poem, brought me back to the days of paper dolls
and stirred up some recent things, too, the last two lines.
A rather sad truth.
Thank you for the read!

-nibbed

Thanks for the review   
I'll edit the second paragraph into something a little more coherent   Cheers!!

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The rhyming scheme here sounded off to me in places, although I don't know if that's intended. The idea starts of nice enough but seems to falter into cynical clichés in the 2 paras in between without adding much. It is not that using common truisms in poems is a cardinal sin (although it often doesn't work in my experience) but there should be something new or interesting added to it.

Paper dolls,
cut to please.
In perfect rows,
sharply creased. So far so good

Ruin marks the passage of time.
All good things fray,
The end never lies. Two sentences that mean the same thing,
Followed by another truism that seems only loosely related and doesn't add up for me.
Paper dolls fall into decay.
This paragraph could have been replaced by the last sentence without much change in the message

Like a scythe,
the clocks hands reave,
Paper doll heads tumble.
Death;
offers reprieve,
to infinities slow shuffle. Tumble and shuffle... don't really rhyme.

Paper dolls stare,
Cut out eyes that never blink. First line has too many syllables, 2nd line too many. Not sure if by intention.
Paper dolls do not care.
Paper dolls do not think.
Nice enough ending.

Overall, this poem doesn't do enough: Paper dolls/puppets/dolls in general as metaphors have been used pretty widely in prose and poetry both: just stating worn out sayings in the context of that theme is hard to appreciate for me. I liked the way it began, though.

Thanks for the review. I did not know this topic was cliche  
I have two questions

Question (1)

With truisms in poetry...what do you mean by adding something new after one? Are you referring to a line with a truism and than possibly adding or including something like a simile along with it it?

Question (2)

I noticed that you refer to syllable count when reviewing poetry. Is it important to attempt to have a similar number of syllables in poetry to make a work flow better?

Thanks!!!

---

Hi, moot, welcome to the site. Some thoughts:

Paper dolls,
cut to please.
In perfect rows,
sharply creased.

Ruin marks the passage of time.
All good things fray,
The end never lies.
Paper dolls fall into decay.
I think these four lines could be cut. You say the same thing in the more interesting lines below.

Like a scythe,
the clocks hands reave, Beautiful lines in image and sonics, not sure you need the comma.
Paper doll heads tumble.
Death;
offers reprieve,
to infinities slow shuffle.
I think the loss of the semicolon and comma would improve this, letting the breaks do their job.

Paper dolls stare,
Cut out eyes that never blink.
Paper dolls do not care.
Paper dolls do not think.
The end lines come back well to the beginning with a similar chill.

Hope this helps, thanks for posting.

Thanks for the review   I hate it when I can't see the poetic forest for the trees. I did not realize I had painted myself into a cliched corner when writing about puppets. I will edit into something that hopefully flows a little better.