The Poet and the Dancer

 
   

      In a corner of the city, where the nights pressed close like secrets and the street lamps flickered with exhaustion, there lived a poet named Ralf. He rented a room above an old dilapidated bookstore, where moths nested. Most of his days were spent writing, not for journals, not for fame but for his own soul!

Ralf was a good man. The best of men in today's time. He loved nothing but his work. And he never cared what people thought of him. He wrote poems. Writing poems alone, wouldn't let him survive the harsh world. So he worked as drummer in weddings. 

Ralf lived alone, with his dog. It was a little puppy that he had rescued from the wicked boys who had tried drowning it in a ditch. The dog loved Ralf and would wag its tail when Ralf would return home after the days work. Ralf was passionate about writing poems. He would write ballads, lyrics and sing it aloud over the din while he drummed in the wedding, to those who cared to listen. 

Ralf would visit the brothel in the city once in a while, to satisfy his carnal desires. The women knew him and enjoyed his company. 

"You are our regular customer, and you get the best discount," the keeper would say. "Wish you worked with us, instead of beating drums at wedding. You would make a fine pimp."

"Aye, madam. But I ain't liking pimping. It's a terrible business - it is! I wouldn't be able to write my poems then."

"What good is writing a poem, Ralf, if it isn't helping anyone? You know only I listen to your poems."

"I am happy by myself. I ain't hurting no one. And I am grateful to you for being a patient listener."

Ralf would often bed with the brothel-keeper who was more amazed of his bedroom skills that made her tolerate his poetry. 

His poems however, belonged to one person: a dancer named Ila, who performed in the weddings. Ralf was mesmerized with her beauty, and he grew to love her from a distance. If he was afraid of anyone, it was Ila.

Ila also performed at a cabaret that was close to the brothel Ralf visited. The air smelled of cheap perfume and cheaper whiskey. Ila danced every night till her body was sore, on the days when she hadn't a wedding program to perform for. She was beautiful, but not in the way social media claimed women should be. Her beauty was bruised, weary, and unknowable. It haunted Ralf, and he would visit the cabaret oftener than he visited the brothel.

Ralf never touched her, never offered to buy what others bought. Instead, he brought poems for her. He left them folded into origami cranes, slipped under her door after the final number. He never signed them, but she knew. No one else saw her the way he did.

His poems for her were passionate full of emotions:

You are the ache in my heart as I write.
You are the angel that makes my dull life bright.
You are the fire that provides me warmth and light.

At first, she thought he was like the rest—just cleverer with words. But he never lingered. He left before the men came backstage, before the dressing-room door clicked open to whispers and folded bills. He loved her, it seemed, but not her body.

And for a while, that felt safe. Good to be loved by someone!

---

They began meeting after her shift, walking through the sleeping city as fog curled around their feet. He read her books she’d never owned or thought to read. He told her the moon wasn’t a moon, but a wound God forgot to stitch shut. She told him about her mother’s demise due to drug overdose, the man who first taught her how to lie, the nights she danced barefoot on broken glass, and the wounds she made on her thighs just to feel something.

He never flinched. In his silence, she felt seen. In her pain, he found poetry.

Ila visited Ralf at his home. They made love only once. It was slow, uncertain, like two people trying to remember what tenderness was. Afterward, Ralf wept. Not from joy, but from fear—he knew something inside him had shifted. The fear of an uncertain judgement seemed to swallow him.

“I’ve never written about happiness,” he whispered into her ear.

“Then write about this,” she said. “Write about me.”

But he didn’t. He couldn’t. His pen failed to produce any words on the paper. His hands shook like it had been paralyzed. 

---

The next morning, when the sun slipped in like a secret, Ila looked at him with something like wonder.

“I love you, Ralf.” Ah! Those beautiful words he had always longed to hear. He blinked. His throat closed. His hands trembled. He kissed her forehead, but said nothing.

That day, he sat at his desk for hours, pen in hand, staring at the page. Nothing came. Not even a bad line. He flipped through his old notebooks, clawing at the edges of inspiration. But the words had abandoned him.

Day after day, he returned to the desk. Blank pages. He stared continuously at the page lying in front of him. Not able to make a word on the paper. Sleepless nights. Even the rhythm of grief had left him. It was as if her love had cured the wound he’d always written from—and without that wound, he had nothing.

Ila watched the change quietly. She stopped dancing with fire. Her movements became mechanical, her eyes elsewhere. The other men noticed. They complained. One even struck her when she wouldn’t smile. She didn’t tell Ralf. He had his silence, and she had hers.

One night when she came to his home, she found him burning his poems in the sink. The room reeked of ash.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked. He looked at her like a man who'd been defeated even after winning.

“Because they mean nothing now. You love me, I suppose. But I want to know, did you join the brothel?”

She reached for him, but he stepped away. "Tell me!"

"It was a necessity. I had no work!"

“I never wanted to be real to you,” he said. “I only knew how to love you from afar. From the ache. Now that you’re here, I don’t know who I am.”

Her voice cracked. “So… what am I supposed to do? Stop loving you so you can write again?”

“No,” he whispered. “But I might have to stop loving you so I can live.”

She stopped. "Let's make love for once, for heaven's sake."

"Not again," Ralf withdrew from her. "You can sleep on the sofa!"

---

The next morning, she was gone. She left no note, only a pair of shoes by the door and one of his poems taped to the mirror:

You loved me best when I was an unfulfilled goal.
Now when I am all yours, you are gone!   

You have something with you, I have none! 

Let me become a ghost again, if it will save your soul.

He searched for her for weeks. Asked the club, the regulars, the other dancers and the harlots at the brothel. No one knew. Some said she’d gone south. Others whispered of a body found by the harbor, nameless, barefoot.

Ralf returned to his room above the bookstore. He stopped writing. He stopped eating. He stopped speaking.

People saw him sometimes, wandering about on the streets at dusk, reciting broken verses under his breath, staring at windows like they might open into another life. They declared him to be a mad man.

---

Years passed.

The cabaret was bulldozed down and a big mall was built. The bookstore below his apartment finally closed. The landlord painted over Ralf’s door, assuming the tenant was long dead. No one had seen him in months, and his body wasn't found.

But in the winter, when the city was quiet and the fog was thick, some swore they could hear footsteps pacing behind that door. And if you stood close enough, you might hear a voice whispering:

You are the poem I was never meant to finish.
And now, I live in the silence, my unfulfilled wish!