​We can't tell yet if the author wrote this mostly for people who love ballet, or if she has a message for a bigger audience. Let's keep that question in mind as we read Firebird by Misty Copeland.

​The space between you and me is longer than forever

​you are the sky and clouds and air

your feet are swift as sunlight

stretching across the skyline like the daylong sun over the horizon​

me? I'm gray as rain

heavy as naptime, low as a storm pressing on rooftops

​

I could never hope to leap the space between​

darling child, don't you know you're just where I started

let the sun shine on your face

your beginning's just begun​

​before the curtain rises

before the spotlight falls​

​before the fireworks of costumes

before before it all​

I was a dancer just like you

a dreaming shooting star of a girl

with work and worlds ahead​

​there I am

sweating at the barre

I had a thousand leaps and falls

switching worn-out slippers

swift as applause​

​even birds must learn to fly

like me, you'll grow steady in grace

spread an arabesque of wings

and climb​

​each position one through five stair steps to the sky?

​

that's right.​

​

​you will soar

become a swan, a beauty, a firebird for sure

​

soon with the same practice

you'll join me

in this dancing dream​

in a pas de deux

a music box for two

​

we will wrap our hearts

careful as ribbons on pointe shoes​

we'll make the night sky our starry curtain

the moon our silver spotlight

as we spin across the planets

pirouetting tightly as the curls on our heads​

spinning wishes for new little ones

we can't yet imagine

​

then they will look to you in wonder

lighter than air and swift as

sunlight turning over the day

and say​

the space between you and me is longer than forever

and I will show them that forever is not so far away​