Commentary of "The Very Old Man With Enormous Wings"

Gabriel Garcia Marquez's short story, "The Very Old Man With Enormous Wings", summarises how the married couple turn their back on the old angel and put the angel in the chicken coop for the others to see. By the end of the story, the ending makes the readers stir up the thought of being insolent to an angel for being different from the initial one. Marquez uses visual imagery and character analysis between the angel and the human spider to support how illusional figures are better off unseen.

Marquez applies visual imagery to support the destruction of illusional figures when interacted with in the human world. The story starts off by the couple finding "a very old man, lying face down on the mud, who, in spite of his tremendous effort could not get up" because of his enormous wings. This makes the reader imagine how the angel looks and from the description, the angel in the story is nowhere close to the initial angel. Another factor that changes the aspect of the angel is the comparison of an illusional angel's and the story angel's movement. While an illusional figure would have a graceful and elegant movement, the movement of the angel in the story was described as a "rag picker". The comparison between the angel in the story and the reader's interpretation of an angel proves how illusional figures should not interact with humans as it destroys the initial interpretation of illusional figures.

While the angel was stuck in the chicken coop, it encountered other humans that carried irrational behaviours that links back to the idea that illusional figures are better off unseen. Marquez decides to se character analogy between the angel and the spider to convey the destruction of illusional beings in the human world. In the story, the angel encounters a maiden spider, a "woman who has been changed into a spider for having disobeyed her parents". Keeping in mind that the spider was once a human, stirred up the emotions of empathy from the other humans. Unlike the spider, the angel was not once a human but rather a conceit figure without any "truth" of "fearful lesson" which in result was not able to stir up any kind of empathy from the humans even if the angel was the one living in such poor conditions; the chicken coop. Marquez analysis's the level of treatment between the angel and the spider by using "human truth" and "fearful lesson" which was "bound to defeat" the "haughty angel who is scarcely deigned to look at mortals". Picking out the different treatments, Marquez shows how the angel is no exception when it comes to stirring human empathy. Proven from one of the evidences, even if the angel is living in a much more poorer condition than the spider, the latter gains more authority from the humans as it talks about it's tragic incident. This proves that illusional figures should not get in contact with humans as it obliterates the initial interpretation of illusional figures and gets easily overlooked by the stirring emotions.

The story ends with the angel looking like "an imaginary dot on the horizon of the sea". The angel is no longer in the human world turning the lives of the couple back to its original state. Although the angel left, the initial image of the angel has already been destroyed. The description of the polar angel and the initial angel and being disdained by human emotions by comparing two different variables with the spider and the angel has marked the end of illusional figures. Therefore, leaving illusional beings alone and letting humans presume anything illusional will help the reconstruction of illusional beings and help the human stay pure and loyal to them.

Its not too late

If I started crying behind you,
would you hear my quiet mumbles?

If I started walking away from you
would you have bothered to stop me?

When I had to cry,
I cried infront of my phone.

When I had to have comfort,
I stood inside the bathroom tolls.

When I needed someone to share my happiness with,
you were away.
Gaming inside the dark smoke-covered room.
Kissing a random girl
whom you met on the streets.

Where is your old self?
You used to notice me cry,
you used to grab me in the hand,
and embrace me until my tears died out.
You used to laugh along with me,
Making time for just the two of us to laugh and cry all day.

Is it because you found out Im different from the rest?
If you found out that
you were my cause of the indifference,
Would you have noticed the tears the slowly sled down?
Would you wipe it off like you used too?

Just a typical day

The little albums

drowned into the shelf of a thousand home

seeks its way out.

The pictures flare out,

unleashing the little flame

thats been dying to lit.

Pictures one by one,

each missing in action

lost inside a puddle of dark, sticky mud.

They hold something,

someone.

I see people standing in the frame.

Smiling, 

Smiling so widely.

Wide enough to swoon the swans to the dirtiest lake.

Wide enough to make a filthy old man turn into a beggar.

Wide enough to make people stop and stare,

and maybe admire for a second or two.

As a motherly hand reaches over and

grab each picture

it lets out a sigh.

Having framed the remains,

we watch as the motherly hand unfolds the final, flaring puzzles that return from its journey,

adding old colours back into her flavourless life.

Glassy Comfort

The softness of your tone,

the rashness of your actions,

the sadness that over flows within the white in your eyes.

Your comfort which comes ever so often

makes me feel like a tiny leaf

being reattached to a bond that

was never meant to be.

Your whispers smoothly conquers every angle of the dim room,

making me turn and twist to every side

feeling the sounds of your heart beat

but not physically there.

Run

I remember being told,
"Taking someone else's smile and placing it on you is the worst crime a person can make.".
Let's take a look at the world now:

Crimes, crimes everywhere.
Every corner,
every alley.
The lights become dim
as they sense emergency.
The police are to busy,
putting people in jail.
Those people,
I wonder
what crime did they do?

Every corner overflows with fear.
Every place we look,
theres always terror.
No rest from hate,
no innocence or peace.
Everything disappears in a black hole.
Those crimes,
we didn't do anything to stop them,
Just passing by, letting them be.
But look us at now
and see where we are.
Like a small dot far into the horizon,
our population is to be nothing but a single grain of sand.
Filled with nothing but distaste and no comfort in trust.


This is what the world has become.
Putting on a blind eye,
cast away,
turned down
when someone is in trouble.
This is what we've become.
Scared in the safety of ourselves.
Just enough courage to runaway ourselves
While just ahead
Another has died.

Death of the petal

The little petals,
gliding softly across the winter storm,
they bring a little dust into the bottle,
that tremors in fear.

The soft howling of the winter storm,
sands swishing and swooshing,
mixing everything from dusk to dawn.

From the little mix,
accidentally poured to a bottle of wine
they do not match.
Not at all.

But the wine swings,
spits venom into its ear,
then comes
a newly mixed wine.
That contains only
emptiness that will soon be the poison flowing into the stream.

Photographing the winds letter

On the peak of the mountain.

Holding the brush, I see you

trying to find a perfect balance for your hands to take.

And as the brush reaches the cold, slim paper,

the wind takes its toll and screeches to the right.

As the wind screams left to right,

the hollow brush follows

not wanting to let go of its ink.

It is writing something,

something that you could not understand 

but you never questioned and 

like the brush,

you let the wind lead you.

-

On the bottom of the mountain,

there,

I stand.

Holding a camera,

finding something to appease myself.

My job as a photographer,

merely surviving all the threats and sacrifices,

now reached the end of the road.

The road that is dark, and unfinished 

with debris layering on top of each other.

Now, a photo must be taken.

Looking around,

nothing comes into the squares of the camera lens.

Shaking and sighing in despair,

I guess 

no photo today,

no photo again.

However the wind takes my camera,

shaking viciously,

forcing my hands to move

to the direction of

where you stand.

-

*Click* *Click*

You lift your head to sense the noise coming from bellow.

You twist and turn,

no signs of delight,

just a serious look of being broken out of trance.

There is no more wind to guide you.

No more wind to shape the letters on the cold, slim paper.

No more wind to scream at the brush.

No more wind to change my direction for another scene.

-

I hand in my photo,

the last of my possession.

Everything I held on to

now gone

but this time

Im letting go of everything

proudly

Because the last thing that holds my name

would be you.

With letters swaying in a bunch

formed by the wind

saying,

"Today is your first opportunity, tomorrow is your last regrets." 

Final relapses

Staying up all night
Watching the camp fire trying to survive,
I see the little passion
it desires to live.

In a huge flame,
into a tiny pebble-like desires,
I watch myself
as it carries me to sleep.

And as if the fire was the fairy dust,
it follows me throughout.
Wondering for something that it has missed,
wishing to catch the remaining debris
of the forgotten dream
that casted on fire.

The path goes and goes,
in circles,
from outside
to inside.
Outlining the layers of my
eyes
now drifting its sight
towards the flame.

From the flames
back to the fire,
the remaining woods
that fuel the fire
burns down
as it reflects its final form
into my eyes.

Too much of one thing

I've touched many hands,

seen many faces,

smelled
 many scents.

But the only one I remember best,

is the hands that we held,

just me and you.
The two imperfect hands from scratch,
to one perfect hand by passion.

Those faces I saw,

those faces I touched.

The only face that scares me to sleep,

is the little face you pull towards me

in the most devilish ways.

A lot of scents,

I cannot distinguish.

Not even your scent enters the blood flow of the hearing.

Those scents you put on,

the scents you provoke with,

I cannot distinguish 

that one scent that brings me
to where you are.

Fly and the leaf

I sit and wonder,
looking ahead that the orange peel of the sun.
"what on earth are you doing?"
the little fly said to me
as it flew past the golden web.

Nothing to be exact, just nothing indeed.
Just a little fact that you past the golden web.
No one indeed, no one exact.
How in the world have you gone threw that shimmering poison?

No words, no words needed.
Just a little wish and a wand would do the trick.
Those little words that you say,
"stop being a thinking and start doing things!"

Now lets turn that around,
now you sit and wonder,
"what on earth are you doing?"
the little falling leaf has spoken to the ground.

Nothing to be exact, nothing indeed.
Just a little weird that you can talk to the ground.
No one indeed, just something for sure,
How in the world would you do that without me?

No words, no actions.
Just a little saying,
A fly can do much more.