“Ballet is artificial. It is like poetry, it is invented. Where words fail, poetry can succeed and the same is true of ballet: something you cannot explain can be expressed on pointe. You can’t tell a story on pointe but it can, when imaginatively used, give you an extra feeling similar to modulations in music or color intensities in light. In this sense, the pointe, even if it cannot tell a story, communicates drama. A ballerina on pointe is the maximum in dance”
-Balanchine