Dancing On The Edge Of A Pin

She was a tiny angel of a woman
Mindlessly moving in a chemical haze.
Her heart barricaded, tormented
from her long, lonely days,
Dancing on the edge on a pin.

Twirling oblivious on a bar room pole,
Trying to live her shoddy role.
Stripped of dignity
Ripped of grace
imposed upon her lifeless soul

Teardrops falling,
Slowly slipping, silently dripping
leaving behind their clear, salty trace
as they slide down her cheeks
like icy blue, watery vein
on a weary, tear stained face

She dances without care
from one seedy place to another
in faded memories blurred by her past
through misty, watery depths she bleeds
trying to quench a thirst so deep
in her hemorrhaged, sedated heart,
so worn, so torn,
by dreams that did not last

She slides down the pole
performing her dance
floating in a blurry, igneous swirl
of aqueous diluted anesthesia.
Demons eating and devouring her soul
through her darkened descent of amnesia.

Stabbing pangs of her painful, stale life
pierce her etiolated soul
sucked dry by roaming fingers
carelessly, ravenously taking their toll.

In painful depths that turn and twist
in her nebulous, muddled reality
of unspeakable memories
that cannot exist…
lest they drive her deeper
into a shattered demise.
Her childhood dreams
stripped cruelly of their parts

Her mind wanders in a foggy
semi-conscious state of grace
from hungry teeth marks left
on her innocent, delicate skin

Cheap neon lights bathe
the trashy, shoddy floors that smell
of stale cigarettes and cheap booze,
in seedy, darkened bars.

Dangerous, dingy, low rent
neighborhoods leased by
lurking, lewd, slovenly men
who try and grope her every move.

She sits on a barstool
sipping cheap, amber colored whiskey
from a dirty, shot glass
waiting for drunk, salacious men
to approach, handing her
their rumpled, grimy cash

Two dollars a dance
to the tune of one weary, old song
or ten dollars an hour
to some drunk, bleary eyed man
for endless moments
she’ll dutifully belong

Shadowy features
biting at her heels
Unnamed creatures
gripping, clawing at her heart,
like broken shreds of steel
from her many wounds
that cannot heal .....
a beautiful soul so used

One sad morning the headlines
of the daily news printed
one, more, sad obituary
of a beautiful life, badly abused.

Her parents were sent a note
from the bar she last danced
    that said…..

“Your daughter used to dance here
But now that she’s dead…..
Will you please stop by and pick up
Her clothes and shoes?”



LadeeAnne~ 

  Anne P Murray; c@ 2011