She had a resplendent smile and hair like the clouds, although people didn’t notice.
No one laughs when she jokes or speaks about the fairies.
All eyes divert as her bare feet hit the blacktop.

Her world is painted with grey strokes, the only color is the airless shade of beryl that swims in her eyes.

She sits down on the sidewalk as she looks up at the red balloons the man is holding on the street corner.
He looks over and sees the girl that no one else notices.
Wanting to give her something, all he has are the floating dreams in his hand.
His days wages will be gone, but he wanted to show the child someone cared.

Not use to kindness, she runs with her treasures to her favorite place.
The bridge over the water where her fairy friends live.
She climbs to the edge, toes gripping the edge while holding her dreams above her head.

Memories dance through her mind as she lets go of the balloons.
They rise as she falls.

Her lips are ice and her cheeks are pale.
Hair is wet and eyes lost, now looking beyond the world in which she was trapped.
The hand, once clasped around a dainty lifeline, now limp.

Floating like a celestial dream that pulls her into the deepest ocean she has ever seen.
Her body bends as she is lifted up, glassy marbled eyes fixed to the sky.

She leapt to follow her last hope, to look for the fairies that called to her.
Now she found a door to another world through nature’s mirror, and at the same time…

fairy wings
lifted towards heaven
greeted by mothers arms