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| Valse, woodcut by Amédée Joyau (1896) |
Learning to Waltz
Death is nothing
without its escort Life,
I see that now.
And Sorrow needs Joy.
These four have
the center of the dance floor.
They waltz with
graceful turns—sweeping, floating—
and we cannot
take our eyes off of them:
Death in deep
tones and Life in light colors,
Sorrow and Joy
radiant in florals.
We still to
watch, thinking to emulate
their steps,
their pleasure and their abandonment.
They must be in
love. They anticipate each change.
Absorbed in
closeness, they don’t notice us.
It’s a splendid
performance. We applaud.
But Life and
Death, Sorrow and Joy don’t stop
to bow. We sway to their rhythm and dance.
Sonnet suggested by Sanaa's Real Toads prompt containing Edna St. Vincent Binet's poem "Spring."
Note: I disabled comments for most of April 2018, International Poetry Writing Month, because I am trying to write and post daily and experiment with prompts from other sites. If you wish to make specific constructive comments, I would be delighted to exchange emails. (Right click on email in my profile.) You can also leave comments on my facebook page where this poem is posted.
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© 2018 Susan L. Chast