In fifth position,

your body is beautiful,
the lift and bend of your arms,
the cradle of your spine, the line
of your neck wisped with hair,
and your sur le cou-de-pied is so slow
and deep that I think gravity
is glory, as you open your hip
to rise, a leg into passè.
At the barre, I watch
you in the mirrors, and I catch
my own posture, that even my chest
has lifted, settled in its own
stillness. Every shadow tells me
I am ready to move. This time,
you simply do not wish to teach
me, to correct anything,
to explain the space I occupy.
For in the most patient of loves,
you might direct me through the music
and its valence of desires,
but you cannot suffer such slowness,
not in this time, not in this movement.

*next*