I.

pink satin masks
blood and broken toes.
i keep effortless poise
while knees and lungs shake.

i dance in tattered tutus,
in old toe shoes,
for a pocketful of coins;

i dance until i am blind with joy,
until my lungs are full of trumpet shouts,
until i am exhausted and weightless,

until my audience is standing,
breath gone, knowing what it is to be--

II.

in the storm of applause
one gnarled hand launches a torch.

"you danced with me," i cry--
her lips seal shut.
wild, cold eyes watch
flames singe my feathers,
fuse flesh to bone,
floorboards collapse.

she stays until she hears
my heart stop.

at dusk,
the stage is ash.

III.

at dawn,
a chorus of mouths emerge from the ground,
my audience, full-throated, white-knuckled,
tchaikovsky hollowing cheeks,
nasoprotivnyia daruia;
knuckles white--

flat-footed, slack-jawed,
the arsonist stands--

and i ascend from the dirt
on pillars of diamond forged from ash,
while my bare feet spill blood and i say
look at the source of my strength--
while new wings spread,
blood-red and gilded and brilliant in the sun--
while fire sprouts like flowers from my palms,
while spiders wrap my toes in silk
and i dance on thick-tongued harmonies
that tremble the earth with new roots
and i bourrée across the green trunks

and i become the sun