Just Outside of Kansas: An Update

Just Outside of Kansas

She wanted to wear the
ruby red slippers
with the kitten heels
because their tapping echoes
could slice through the silence
of the dimly lit room
littered with yoga mats.
She wanted to click her heels together
to announce her
self
as she waded through
sweating contortionists
balancing and breathing
in lycra-clad symbiotic communion.

Root tendrils
crept
then burrowed into the floor
through the wood and concrete
to the compacted earth below -
they perched on single tree trunk legs
and stretched their fingerling branches
toward realization.

She could only think of her
scarlet slippers
and the way they cupped her
sore feet
while she step-ball-changed
down the yellow road
looking for home.

Golden eagles
exploded
across the cold sky
like arrows to the clouds
piercing the arctic blue
of enlightenment,
only to fall short of the sun.

But those blood-red sequined slippers
repelled witches
and other terrors of the
dark wood.
They shielded and protected
while she waited for
help.

In the vast womb
of the room,
the collective transcendence
bound her stubborn ankles
until she kicked
her armored slippers
off.

©2019, Tracy Willis