Rise
One appointment.
She was one appointment away from pushing her passion to astonishing levels.
One dancer.
One dream.
One diagnosis.
One heart broken.
They started with a surgery,
Closely followed by crutches and P.T.
But the thing that broke her,
Pushed her into mind-numbing despair,
Were the words.
Condemning her,
Taunting her.
“You can’t dance.”
“Can’t run.”
“Can’t jump.”
Small words but they were enough to send her world spinning,
Spinning like her once flawless pirouettes.
Another surgery.
Another crippling blow to her body and heart.
Despair choked her,
Strangled her like an anaconda.
But we are all made of stardust,
And our souls are forged in steel.
We are strong enough to be resilient.
Strong enough to be pushed down and stand back up.
Strong enough to survive.
Because we are not victims,
And one challenge is not the end.
With one dream broken, another is formed.
A new light seeping into her splintered heart,
Filling the cracks with a new goal, a new promise:
To rise.
Rise from the pain and the words,
The one that almost broke her.
Rise from her final curtsy at curtain’s call.
Rise when they tell her she can’t
But every bone in her body knows that she can.
When they treat her as weaker,
But the truth is, she has never felt stronger.
So she does all she can do:
She rises.