Sarah was teaching the Chinese dance to a group of girls when the third poem entered the spotlight. The Chinese girls were a little bit younger than her snowflakes, and none of them in both classes. But a Waltz of the Flowers rehearsal, which consisted of the snowflakes, had just finished. Sarah hadn't given the second more much thought in a while, but it occasionally crept back into her mind. She tried to turn it away, because its words secretly made her nervous. What if someone was being bullied here? That's what it sounded like.
But Sarah was afraid. So she tried to make it go away.
"Good, well done," she said instead, clapping her hands at the sixth graders who were all breathing hard. "Just remember, Lacy, to keep you plie right before that turn from fifth." Lacy nodded in understanding. "Okay, well, girls, take a water break, 'kay?"
The dancers appreciatively turned to their respective dance bags. One of them, Amy, asked if she could go to the restroom. Sarah said yesm, but hurry. Only a few moments later, she came back, looking worried.
"Um, Ms. Sarah? There's something you should see..." Amy took Sarah into the smal, one-person bathroom and pointed at the mirror hanging over the sink. Sarah squinted in the yellowish light.
It was written with some sort of marker, probably Expo. The ink was either blue or purple, but the weird lighting made it hard to see.
Still, it was unmistakably a poem.
This place
Tears have fallen,
Frozen tears.
Many times,
Hidden from the routines,
That are just too hard.
I will give you words to know,
But not enough to understand.
YOU ARE READING
Letters From a Dancer
PoetryDance teacher Sarah Andrews can see many things coming. But when she starts to receive mysterious, anonymous poems from one of her students telling her of the sad experiences she has had at the dance studio, Sarah doesn't know what to do. The only t...
