Dancing feet

In the supermarket
I turn to pick up some tomatoes
and find my feet
pivoting in a dance step.

Later on, choosing a bag of sugar, I notice
they’re doing it again – one foot
skimming the outline of the other,
rhythmically crossing
in front
behind.

And I realise that, this weekend
I have danced further than I have walked
and my feet are enjoying
their new,
less pedestrian,
vocation.

Indeed my feet feel alive -
tingling softly with a happiness
that seems to have very little to do
with what my mind is thinking. So
wherever I go, I arrive on a cushion
of happiness
(like a hovercraft on air)
which makes it hard to be sad, or daunted.

A strange feeling -
to walk around on happy feet
and feel cheerfulness spread up my body
as if every tiny cell is dancing
to some unheard music.

Little boy’s toy… another friday five poem

Torn page held tight in his dirty hand
The little boy runs, his eyes intent
Panting with eager delight in his plan.
Until at last, strength almost spent

He bounds happily up the toyshop stair.
A bell announces the entrance of the boy
Into paradise’s market! Finally there….
His breath steadies as he waits, alive with joy,

For his turn. He smooths the crinkled image
Out on the counter, scatters his piggy bank’s bliss
Across the glassy counter’s gleaming mirage.
At last he can ask “do you have this?”

At last the box is lifted from the cart
And he clutches it to his racing heart.

It struck me that many of the poems or texts written for poefusion’s latest friday five (little boy, torn page, market, dirt, cart) including the first one I wrote myself, were rather melancholy in tone. I wondered if this was simply because of what the words suggested, and decided to experiment with the idea of writing a happy poem based around these words. I rather liked the resulting sonnet!

Picture uploaded by the Library of Congress onto Flickr

Unexplained happiness

Often recently I’ve found myself experiencing moments of unexplained happiness.

They don’t seem to have much to do with my life circumstances in any obvious way.

It’s just every now and again I feel so glad to be alive, and to be me. Riding up to my apartment in the lift this evening I suddenly just felt like dancing.

It’s a bit like those moments when you’re in the early stages of falling in love and you get those intense flashes of feeling great about yourself and where you are in your life.

Except I’m not in love. And life is certainly no bed of roses at present – full of challenges.

But perhaps that’s why I have these flashes of feeling good about myself – when I feel I’ve dealt well with a challenge, had a productive day, turned a rock into a rose.

I think it’s also got a lot to do with resting comfortably in a sense of who I am, and the value of the person I am. The deep confidence that I won from the teeth of a painful rejection. It’s definitely part of me now, but I tend to forget it quite easily, so I’ve been consciously trying to strengthen that feeling, sometimes doing something close to a meditation practice, othertimes just trying to remember that feeling when things aren’t going well. It seems to be bearing fruit.

I sincerely wish that you, much-appreciated reader, may also experience sunbursts of inexplicable happiness in your life.

Dance like there’s no-one watching…

Couldn’t resist posting this image of Calvin and Hobbes – I just love how it captures the sheer bliss of being utterly immersed in music and dance! Being able to be this spontaneous and unselfconscious is such a gift…

Click here to see the whole cartoon and more like it at gocomics.com