Sparkle

SPARKLE

I was standing in a crowd when I noticed her.  It was her magnetic face that had me transfixed.

She was shorter than the crowd that she stood in, mingling around their elbows and the hems of their coats.  She stood eating a cookie not hearing or interested in their chatter.  Her large eyes sparkled, a rim of royal blue surrounding her pupils.  Nothing could extinguish the luminous blaze within them, except when she lowered her soft, dusted lids, sewn with long, lustrous lashes.  She appeared to be thinking of far away places, maybe the hayloft that was her play haven yesterday.

Someone spoke to her and she looked up and smiled.  She illuminated the group with that luscious smile of laughter, exposing her pearl white teeth spaced playfully behind those puffed, full lips.

She looked around her at the crowd, her soft curls, brushing a sleeve.  Her bobbed top, like wisps of smoke encircling her round face, could certainly pose no fuss for her: for she had much to do; run through meadows and tease with jokes and tricks of enticement.  That was when I noticed that I was staring at her.  I hadn’t taken my eyes off of her.  She looked at me questioningly.  Why was I staring at her?  She looked away and I noticed her face scattered with freckles that clustered on her little pug nose, like laughter itself.

Dazed, like a sleepwalker, I moved over to her to introduce myself, mesmerized by her flowing presence of comfort and ease.  I had to kneel to meet her face to face.  She lowered her chin in a slight blush of color.  Her thick lashes batted on her rosy cheeks. 

She shook my hand and smiled that enchanting grin.  She looked away and thrust her hands deep into the pockets of her worn blue jeans that hugged her small body like a comfortable part of her life.  She casually reached to grab another cookie, clothed in a yellow cowgirl shirt, she looked like a flower, a breath of fresh air, a ray of sunshine, Spring, Herself.

When she turned to leave, her spirited gait leading her out of my life, like a young colt with an independent mind, I noticed that she resembled a boy.  Could I have been mistaken?  But before she was completely gone through the doorway, she turned and met my eyes once more.  Her cheeks rose and her lips parted giving way to the incandescent smile that warmed my heart like a fire on a cold day.

She was a treasure, alive, a bright light.  As I realized that I stood alone, I thought of her sparkle and how she must illuminate her friends’ and family’s lives.