The Dance of the Butterfly
After the Occupational Therapist told me I’d never walk again (see my poem “What She Said”); I was in shock, but my being turned to my ballet days to recall when my legs were strong and I immediately wrote this, while listening to The Butterfly Concerto. It is a poem of my courage.
“THE DANCE OF THE BUTTERFLY”
Oh! How she sparkles through her dance!
Tchaikovsky himself gazes from the stage’s wings
Applauding the height and instants of hesitation
Of her punctuating arabesques. He applauds
With his hands in his pockets, tapping the sides
Of his thighs and a tear of appreciation rises
In his eyes. There can be no doubt she has caught
The audience in her fluttering net, in her crossings
Of the stage so carried by the violin’s sweeps
Of the scales and the flute’s endearing notes
Of imitating a breeze-buoying flight.
But it is the ballerina herself who sets the gold
To crown his composed inspiration as she
Performs a pas de deux with his concerto!
The violin marks each pointe set to her chines.
The orchestra is a narrative riding her eclipses
Of beauty. The timpani exclaims her leaps.
With port de bras, from bow to extending reach,
Her arms become marigold wings...and
Her elan lifts her heart to address the stars.
The young girl, with her head above, yet sunken into,
The soft, cloud-like folds of her pillow, listens
To the riveting Butterfly Concerto sound up
Through the foam of her pillow
(Where her radio will not bother her parents)
...And her shoulders
Slightly rise with each crescendo. She inhales
At the peak of every releve, and, with a lifting of
Arms to barely cross above her head —
In elegant elan — before a rapid circling of the stage.
The music’s tempo mounts to conclusion. She
Takes an instant to feel she is performing her
Best...Surely, oh, surely,
Tchaikovsky, stands rapt
Aside the curtain wings, applauding.
**********************************
by sally Young eslinger 8/25/2020
Thanks be to God!
Copyright © Sally Eslinger | Year Posted 2020
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