Dancing Shoes

Dancing Shoes

Original Poem by Alex Leatherwood

Dancing Shoes,

The way they lightly flitted onto those feet,

Unaware of the changing of a life of a little girl.

Beaming, those chubby cheeks did,

When she realized the journey of movement would bring her the happiness craved.

Dancing Shoes,

Like life shown from them when those feet flew across the floor.

Twelve years of blissful torture,

Repeat, Repeat until done right and those shoes carried her on its wings,

The dream of completing the journey in her reach.

Damned Dancing Shoes!

Burning with regret, thrown into a closet

Remembering they had let the little girl fall, fall

Like a rock falling off of a cliff.

The dream, her heart, the shoes,

Gone, the End.

The little girl,

No longer hopeful, like when the sun comes out signaling a new day,

But now like a frail flower, that hasn’t been watered.

The girl, not allowed to put on her dancing shoes again,

Tries to find a new pair that kiss her feet softly,

Walking bare-foot everywhere, searching.

The girl,

Knowing the dream has been flung out the door,

But still opens the closet, looks down,

Picking the dancing shoes up, cradling them like a new born child,

Tries to see if the glass slipper still fits.

Her lonely feet, trying to shove their way in, failing.

The girl,

This time,

Builds a shelf for the dancing shoes,

Not throwing, but gingerly, kissing them slightly,

Puts them on the shelf, her last time to see them,

The end of the dream, the beginning of another.