Shoe

I will have a ball to find a bride.
If the one I choose eludes me, I'll put
pitch on the palace stairs. The shoe unstuck from
the pitch will try the foot of each maiden
in my kingdom till it touches she who
charmed me, fled so intriguingly away…
Abroad, rumours of a list as long as
a baptismal robe, of names ticked off
one by one — and tales of my gilt carriage
racketing over cobbles, squeezed through
tilted lanes where none has ever glimpsed it
so that it's whispered to be a ghost carriage…
But I am inside — a living prince
on this royally upholstered quest.
The foot I seek will be the least likely,
no doubt — belonging to an unkempt girl
with the same oceanic eyes I swam through…
Now she's before me. Her left foot enters
the shoe. She draws its mate from her pocket,
slips it on, and waltzes around the room.
Not waiting for second thoughts, I join her.