The speaker is at a crowded ice rink, feeling out of place. Their skates are ugly, they arrived late, and everyone else seems effortlessly graceful. Slipping and spinning out of control, they get advice from other skaters but don't feel that these people understand their situation. Others treat the ice as solid ground, while the speaker feels frozen, like a fragile porcelain doll with painted cheeks.
The second half turns to a bigger image: the speaker is a cannonball pretending to be a feather. The disguise can only last so long before it breaks into metal shards in a fall. The skating works as a stand-in for any situation where someone fakes belonging, and the poem suggests the speaker feels like an impostor. The mood is self-mocking and anxious, with a wry humour on top. The ending is uneasy: the speaker expects to be found out, and admits honesty has always been a problem for them.