My father told me once to beware the butter yellow pinpricks in the field,

He told me, stay still, eyes narrowed, don’t look at the skinned lemon peels,

Well, I was five, and in my eyes, the only thing a little girl could want to try  

Was to spend her days sighing on the wings of a dandelion,

My father sighed too but acquiesed when I begged for nothing less

Than a shooting star's wish,

Closed my eyes, raised a hand to the sky, and thus the match was lit.

My father watched to be sure ‘til I knocked back on the door at 11:59 pm.

Afraid, it seems, I’d be raised feral by weeds without his agreement.

Well, I was ten, and then again, the little girl journeyed to the forest glen,

And couldn’t help herself smiling in the lap of the dandelions,

My father tried to dissuade from the hours without shade, 

But I didn’t care if the burns didn’t fade with a wish,

Bided my time, tore my gown in the climb, and thus the match was lit.

My father walked there with me once, and through the spyglass of love, he tried to understand

But I knew if he could ever choose, he wouldn’t have come back.

Well, soon I turned fifteen and the silver screen held far more promise for me,

And I couldn’t picture lying in the grasp of the dandelions

Traded my winter boots and yellow-golden roots for stiletto shoes and the color blue, replacing my old wish.

Tasting drinks of lime, but forgetting my rhymes, and I thought the match extinguished.

My father said one day when I was twenty three, like a song, “Do you know how long it’s been since you’ve been gone?”

So he took his cane and he took my hand, and I wasn’t sure if either of us could stand

Bare feet to the humming and strumming of copper violins,

To the loving and wondering about flowers in the wind,

And for a moment, I am a little girl who thinks she’ll never die in

The arms of a dandelion, her lips twisted in a wish,

My father shook his head at the playing pretend and all of this,

But with two grins and two pockets full of flint, together, we made sure the match stayed lit. 

Amazing, isn’t it, how a simple ballerina twirl, flying 

Can make, out of a little girl, a queen of dandelions?