to dance without the dream
She remembered when dancing had been a distant dream, spun of ungilded rooms and the arhythmic tapping of her siblings’ shoes against the floor. They had seemed to her, a child of not even five years back then, the very picture of perfection-- for what could be better than this? Her brother and sister, waltzing so wonderfully through the little room meant only for the three of them. And when Maria began to clap and cheer, and Minerva’s displeased face (she tried (and failed, hee hee) so hard to hide it!) fell away to a sheepish little smile? Why, little Maria knew the answer: nothing could possibly be better. Nothing at all.
And a distant dream it remained, no matter how ardently she tried to make it ring in the step of her feet against stone; it never did. Without the warmth of hands to guide her, the sound scarcely traveled at all, and the little princess did not want to dream anymore.
Then one day, she was free, but she forgot about the dancing when half her dreams nearly died within her arms, and she watched as they flew away on wicked and wonderful wings. Such dreams were beyond repair, or so her brother’s flight led her to believe, but Maria knew better-- had felt it in the gentle waking curl of his fingers around hands clasped in prayer, and seen it in the ceaselessly gentle eyes of a queen crowned and unmade by the sharp blades of war. It only slept; it did not die.
. . .
. .
.
It was Prince Marth with whom little Maria of Macedon danced first, long after her wishes had taken on the wings of simpler, grander things, his head heavy with the crown of a king and her feet unsteadied by the warbling songs of which all childish loves would sing. How joyous a day, to see him smile so brightly! One would think a girl of such tender years to be burned by the wedding of her very first love, but it had never been greed with which Maria loved Marth. She loved him as a robin loved the spring, or a rose the sun which warmed it -- with gently spun wishes and with all her heart… and yes, with the clumsy stepping-on of toes, too.
“I-I’m sorry!” She had uncharacteristically stammered, the bright flush of petals scattered across her cheeks. He laughed merrily for her in turn, her own quick to follow, and that, she thought, had been enough to lay to rest the last of the broken things.
But the heart would ever remember what the mind falsely forgot, and on the fringes of a ballroom where only they belonged, Maria danced for a second time with a boy with warm hands. Though his words were curt and his expression so far into the realm of befuddled she could never mistake it for anything else (hee hee!), not once did he let go-- and she, for her part, though the ballroom was gilded and he did not cast such long shadows as her siblings did so many years ago, listened with all that she was.
For there was no law in the land outside of fairytales that commanded every bright and heart-born thing to lay stagnant without growing, without changing, and on her very own wings of chiffon and wisteria, the little princess of Macedon remembered how a dream could take flight. She could dance, all on her own now, and took flight to stages both snowy and shining-- danced with darling dragons and ribbon-fetching friends; with those of booming voices and fleeting lightspun smiles; she danced without even stepping on toes (eventually!), and at last, though it were not her final stage (that rested elsewhere, across sea and sky, in an ungilded room filled by three), Maria danced with Marth once more.
“You look happy, Maria.”
She is. The song in her heart no longer warbles, but it is just as gentle as it ever was.
“That’s because I am, Prince Marth! Hee hee. What about you?”
Light shines in her steps, trailed by feathers and a thousand little joys -- gifts, each and every one.
Marth smiles.
