Barefoot Soliloquy

Title art by Brooke Shaden. Click image to visit her studio.

Barefoot in the crisp Autumn leaves
She dances with abandonment seldom seen
The angels pray for just one morsel of her faith
As they grieve the passing of the lost summers eve

Steady as she proceeds but not however gingerly
Unwary of the trees that contort all about her
Branches unfurl as She tastefully twirls
Yearning for one very briefest encounter

Out here in the greenwood She is free
Can dance until her heart’s content and then transcend its gentle beat
No need for vague sentiment
For tis nowt more than an ornamental piece
To one so illustrious as She

A trinket
A keepsake
High maintenance cliché
But this is not to say that she is blasé as she eats cake
For within resides a deep ache
And it threatens to consume her if this organ fails to keep pace

Long since hidden away in a secret place it need never be found
No vacant ground as She drapes around every blade of Jade grass that she happens to pass
Each pulse indistinguishable from the last without ever once making a solitary sound
Ever profoundly
And with never a frown

For her soul is uncaged
Disengaged from the cradle within which it was detained
Eyes no longer strained since they shed tears in its namesake
Reawakening from one long perpetual wake
In her divine name
Buried with a smile spread right across her handsomely beautiful face
None more exquisitely frame the purity of grace

Barefoot in the crisp Autumn leaves
They crunch beneath the pads of her dainty little feet as She fancifully fleets
For She moves with a shadow by her side
Shade matching hers stride for stride
Her heart beat for beat
And never to recede

Down in the woods somewhere
They play the games that children play
Smile the way that children smile
Laugh the way that children laugh
Say the things that children say
Skim stones across a vermilion bay
Take never ever failing leaps of faith
Barefoot in the crisp Autumn leaves this day

Richard Charles Stevens

Keeper of The Crimson Quill