Dance

On scarred green corduroy couches, lined with age, sighing under my weight- Like bearded old men, releasing ages of wearied wisdom, Slipping in their sleep- In rooms wreathed in smoke, wafting between breaths of laughter and exhale And somehow beautiful, electricity in the music that shallows me out And haunts. I see the wooden floor, again, as you lead me, my feet moving to their own beat Pound, pound, my heart and my shoes, Do I know what’s happening? And the rhythm I have is my own, but you don’t mind. Two hands grasp mine, warm with sweat Restraining, I have no escape, I breathe but I don’t know how. Can I meet your eyes? Two black holes, a vortex, pulling me into the tornado and the storm, And the calmness in the middle, intense as it sparkles and shimmers in clarity, Fading out cat-calls and undertones of despair. Fading me into you, dissolving me through layers of dermis and epidermis soaking silently through cotton and fear A puddle on your now-closed eyelids, wrinkly in determination smoothing out in waves of hope. And then –you’re here, I feel Shaky confusion, slippery thrill, wet and winsome glory Searching, and finding -so I thought- And sudden twists and turns Do you know where you’re going? And then I feel it, the smile, maybe you won’t It grows inside of me and gives birth, to a tiny laugh In high falsetto, notes dancing across a page Barred inside snow-white fields, but exploding with mirthful mischief just the same. So am I, and you may imprison me, But I sing “in my chains like the sea”.* *from Dylan Thomas’s “Fern Hill”