The Dance Master

A Poem by Laurence David Sterling III

I went through life
Like a gawky teenager at a Senior Prom,
Off on the side-lines,
Indistinguishable from the rest of the sideline sitters,
I did not expect to see or be seen.
Clumped in the faceless masses,
There among the hurt looks and dreams of popularity,
I waited life out,
Fearful of the lights coming on, and revealing tears
rolling from eyes blurred by the expectation of mediocrity.
Dressed to kill, but dead already,
I hardly noticed the change in the music and the wildness of the beat.
Drifting through life 
Numb to my surroundings and the calls to the dance floor,
I was alone without a date,
Without someone to call my own.
Suddenly, I felt the dance master's hand in mine.
Immediately the spotlight bathed me in white.
Instantly I went from obscurity to notoriety.
Not me...Why me?...Oh me!
As the master took my hand,
The fear of the dance,
Turned into the joy of the dance.
The music lifted me,
And floated me here and there,
Until all was in balance,
Master, Music and Me.

Recuerdos de la Alhambra by Francisco Tárrega