Anna Pavlova stepped onto another stage
at first, so imperceptibly,
in more than pave diamond Light.
it doesn’t take so much to know,
even in surroundings that new
she’d hardly feel the difference: always dreaming
past you in her own distances, anyway;
waking up in this recurring dream
as it very driftingly came to her
that even when she was telling the
first dream to a dream-friend:
“I had this dream…”
she’s still in a
a subset of the
larger dream and
not awake yet…
will I catch fire?
she whispered to herself onstage-
upsetting the candles at the stage’s
rim (not knowing they were stars)
blue distances don’t make me cry
the way they used to;
will I forget how to breathe - again-?
then, realizing some mistake,
unfocused light,some trepitude, alarm,
a phantom fluttering of the heart already phantom
how will I die here?
but that was earlier…and before-
fresh angels sewed
strange jewels on the
same costume
festooned her dress with unfamiliar flowers
and every step
and gesture she
remembered as if snow
could be conscious of snowing (itself)
again.
my feet aren’t bleeding -anymore-
she marveled out of sight and
fluttering softly, softer through
such hues of silkeness beyond distress.
angels watched her turn
into a pearl diminishment of light
and trying to speak, but failing-
she found, with joy,
she couldn’t end-
that it was
like a mirror reflection endlessly
ribboning into another mirror…
but real
and vivid fine crystal etched as
she always knew
the sheen of ballet could be
if one stayed up White Nights
to wind the music-box…
always running down
Anna Pavlova, I am standing still
not moving through space as through an afterlife
before the Afterlife
I said softly to her there- and
not in a lithograph of my own time-
here at a door I’m not permitted to enter
with one rosebud
question left, -I’m quarter-turned - and unresolved
not wishing to wound my God, my Christ,
my Full-Blown Rose
trespassing on your wilderness, winter's bloom
an opalescence irretrievable now:
some questions don’t belong to me at all
even if blue distances can’t make me cry
as Mandelstam, for the draping of another Anna's shawl
the profile swan, the living cameo...
the way they used to…
it’s only that it streams so hauntingly on and on… and sometimes,
beautiful beyond bearing that
Anna Pavlova stepped out on another stage
surpassing all comparisons, and dying too many times
at last, perfected her intricate petit pointe
revealing the flash-points of the Living Swan
and mignonette variations on the evening air…
though it’s
perishable as any dream strophe can be:
let something heartfelt still seep through
like music from another room, far distant Court or undersea-
though it’s like baby star-shine
learning to be, “star”-not any star, but Yours, alone-
(my God)
Anna Pavlova stepped out on another stage:
when will Russia ..
through prayers barely spoken
it shall be wrought:
blue distances won’t make you cry anymore,
tenderly was whispered.
mary angela douglas 29-31 january 2012 rev. 8 january 2018;2 january 2024
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