The Old Lady is at it Again
Sept 5 2010


The old lady is at it again
walking down the side of the road,
raising her arm in a graceful arc
breaking into pirouettes
bouncing up on tip-toe,
stepping with the unexpected lightness
of a ballerina.
She wears the same muddy gumboots
shabby jacket
bright orange safety vest,
ignoring traffic
impervious to stares.

This is what enchanted little girls
who dream of princesses
insist on tutus and tiaras
skip all the way back to school,
and dance, like long-legged colts let go
become;
growing up
just as they imagined.

This old lady, who is the object of fun
the taunts of thoughtless drivers
inspires me.
Because she still contains the little girl,
has stayed undaunted
despite living long, and hard,
remains a dancer at heart.

I watch her go
tripping lightly down the side of the road.
As the voice in her head
calling her to dinner
goes unheard,
drowned out by the sound
of the overture.




I’ve actually seen this lady many times, driving on my rough two lane road. She’s out on the unpaved shoulder -- in all kinds of weather, always dressed the same -- walking with an odd self-contained determination. The first impulse is to label her crazy, walking in that idiosyncratic exaggerated fashion of hers. But the other day, in a sudden flash, I saw her in a different light: that this is what those mysterious ethereal little girls, who live in their own enchanted world, would grow up to be; that is, if life didn’t get there first and beat it out of them. So I saw her more as an exemplar, than someone to be pitied or shunned.

She actually looks a lot less graceful than I’ve depicted, her movements more stereotyped and strange, more flappy and stiff. So she probably is a little “off”. But the way she comes through in the poem is how I’d prefer to see her.

I think “ethereal” is the perfect word to describe this type of little girl: the type who lives in her own magical world in her own little head, utterly innocent and unselfconscious. But it just didn’t work in the poem: maybe because it doesn’t sound right, or takes too much semantic processing, or has an unpleasant “mouth feel”. I had to let it go. On the other hand, it’s always better to show something than say it. So perhaps the poem works best like this, anyway.