Me Animal Soul

[Exit]

Me Animal Soul

We’re born from a fold,  this first use of  "fold" suggests a sheep fold, i.e. an (open) enclosure holding domestic animals... fitting mid-word of the title
of infinite folds— and here the alternate meaning is suggested, then confirmed by "pleats" in the following line; good use of em-dash
pleats of ειδoς and υλη.  seeking a good English translation, "matter" will do for the one (though "stuff" might also work) but, rather than "species" or "kind" (which is too multi-faceted in English) I like "instance" for the other
Born to bones, and  good alliteration this line
expressions of bones, many nice directions this could go - DNA as bones of a kind, body-language of our foundational stick-figures
into a sorrow escaped from a joy. a nice expression, but does it follow from the rest of the poem?

Hate to quibble and carp, but intensive was requested.  So...

Number switch between title and body of the work:  "Me" could be taken as dialect for "my," but even so the work itself discusses only generalities of the human condition.  The connection isn't far-fetched ("here's what I'm like, as are we all") but perhaps it could be suggested in the title.  Or the individual speaker/writer confirmed or acknowledged by use of the singular somewhere below.

fold:  after the quite nice initial use, the second certainly creates an image.  Unfortunately, it doesn't quite work:  an origami figure is made of folds, yes, but the people you're describing are made up of random or purposeful bifurcations - trees, bushes of decisions, rather than two- or three-dimensional sheet-figures.  It's not bad, just not perfect; I have no suggestion for improvement. 

Had to look up the Greek - my zombie languages end at Latin.  No points off for that, it's the language of philosophy.  If you decide to use English there, I advocate for "instance" which would also tie back to the individual of "me" in your title.

And the last line.  The rest of the work does not prepare us for this (except, perhaps, with "expression").  Furthermore, it's an unsupported assertion that, being without foundation elsewhere, could go either way (why life=sorrow, pre-life=joy?  why not pre-life=insensate, life=sensational?)  What I'm saying is, the progression of the rest of the poem doesn't seem to lead here.  Now, there's nothing wrong with introducing a new thought, as in the final couplet of a sonnet, but there should be some reason for it to be in the same poem.

Having said that, it's well done and nicely executed; it just seems as though the last line might have come about because you needed a last line or, if that was in mind all along, the preceding material doesn't lead up to it.

Hello, thank you again for the critique. I've taken it all on board. 
Okay, so firstly you highlighted a typo on my part—whether you intended to or not— but thanks for that. It should be εἶδος and not ειδoς (the anglo approximation being eidos, my error). But still, I'm thinking about translating the Greek and just having English. I had assumed these were universally well-known greek words and a well-known dichotomy. Which is a shame because, god damn doesn't greek look pretty. Yet it also looks pretty pretentious if it's not generally understood, so.

Um, what else? Oh yes, the last line. Well, I suppose as I'm playing with the ambiguity of certain words here (throughout the poem) I can't complain about interpretations I hadn't accounted for. There are just far too many variables. And I don't want to take away that ambiguity by giving a definitive explanation of the poem—that would ruin it—but I will say that maybe one way to interpret this is from a less family-friendly place when contemplating the joyful folds you escape from

Thank you.