Moonlight Ballerina

It started as the kind of night

I always feel with you:

Love and joy and tenderness –

An intoxicating brew.

Those big expressive eyes of yours

Were dancing with delight.

Your smile, your laugh, your silliness –

A once-in-a-lifetime sight.

And then when we were going home,

Ambling through the park,

You ran a little ahead of me

And there in the silvery dark,

I saw you leap into the air

And do a pirouette –

The kind you did as a little girl

At your weekly ballet vignette.

Only Julia and I were there

When you bolted toward the sky.

But it felt as if you were at the Bolshoi

On a crowd-applauding high.

Because this spontaneous little act

Reflected such unbridled zest,

I know it sprang from deep in your heart –

The place where stardom rests.

Two years later I still recall

The wonder of that scene.

Your exuberance returns so vividly

In dream after dream after dream.

Show me again the happiness

You showed me on that day,

And, I promise, my Moonlight Ballerina,

I will love you, come what may

(Feature photo of Irina Semenjuk from Ukraine. Courtesy photo.)