Longing for Dance, 16-20

 

16. 

Young me wanted the Pied Piper

to come one night to our town, 

play sweetest notes on his magic flute

and call us all away – we children

who longed to escape the adult world.

What lands would he lead us to, dancing?

What fairytale surprises had always awaited

down past the end of the lane, out and away

across the fields and into the far forest? 

I knew I would never come dancing back.

17. 

The Seventh Seal 

ends – or begins? 

Death leads a line 

of following figures 

stretching raggedly 

along the hilly horizon:

black silhouettes

against white sky.

They are holding hands.

They appear to be dancing.

18.

When I was a little kid, dancing

was what I did for joy. I didn’t

even need music. I twirled and 

jumped and threw my arms up,

and went round and round and

kicked my legs and spun on my 

tiptoes, and of course there was 

always delicious squealing. Oh,

when I was little, I knew nothing 

at all about dancing, I simply did.

19.

She calls to me, my tiny cat,

insistently, with loud and 

strident voice. I pick her up, 

I rock her in my arms. She purrs. 

Her small paws flex, 

ecstatic. I dance with her

around and around the room.

Oh, I croon, the things we do!

The things we do, the things we do,

the things we do for love.

20.

What happens when the dancing stops?

Ring-a-ring-a-rosy, all fall down?

‘Thank you,’ politely and go separate ways?

Or, shall this be a new romance?

After the ball, do those likely lads

straighten their uniforms and march off to war?

(That has been known to happen. Think Waterloo.)

Or do we wind down quietly in the old church hall

while the musos pack up their tired instruments, 

and then all toddle home to a nice, calm bed?

See also Poems 1-5, Poems 6-10, and Poems 11-15.

The whole sequence is now available as a free ebook. To access it (and others) first go here.

Longing for Dance, 11-15

 (third set of five 10-line poems, of a sequence of 20 on the theme of dance)

11.

Then there was the time –

how old was I? 19? 20? –

when I worked part-time,

evenings and weekends,

as a cinema usherette

for the filmed Swan Lake

with Nureyev and Fonteyn

(that ‘magical partnership’ the press 

said, truthfully). Magic and beauty 

repeated, for me, every night.

12.

Dancing

around the subject of dancing,

I find the tempo and 

gesticulations vary

according to the main

thrust of the desired

direction, the ultimate end.

This of course depends 

on mood, purpose, stamina –

and most of all the random!

 

13.

The journey from birth to grave,

is that a dance, do you think?

Or is it a slow, plodding march,

or maybe a crawl?

I like to think it’s a dance,

even when the limbs deteriorate.

It could be a dance with a gentle, 

lengthy rhythm, or perhaps 

only very tiny steps. So long as 

one still keeps going, it’s a progress.

14. 

I can’t be holding light

between my clumsy hands!

They are an old woman’s hands

(obviously, I being an old woman).

Light wants to dance, and does dance

out of my hands and across the gaps

between people; between me and 

other people. Watch it flicker and leap!

The dance of light then dips low: a ballerina 

gracefully saluting her enthralled audience.

15.

I am hungry. I am ardent.

I fling my arms. I am fierce. 

I dance by stamping on the ground.

I dance by lifting high my knees 

and my busy, flashing heels.

Oh, this is a ferocious dance!

We have built it together, we

who refuse to go quietly into a

respectable ageing. Let us make 

fools of ourselves, let us win!

See also Poems 1-5, Poems 6-10 and Poems 16-20.

The whole sequence is now available as a free ebook. To access it (and others) first go here.

Longing for Dance, 6-10

 (the second five of a sequence of 20 10-line poems on the theme of dance)

6. 

‘Me and Bobby McGee,’ sang Janis

and I slid around the living-room floor

behind my broom, dancing like

no-one was watching (no-one was)

and chiming in with, ‘Freedom’s just

another word for nothing left to lose’ –

my moves gloriously free, because

no-one could see them, not even me –

and shouting out the words tuneless …

briefly escaping my young mother-wife-hood.

7.

Two of my Capricorn friends

(I have a lot of them; it must be

a thing, that Capricorns work

as friends with Scorpio: they’re

among my best friends … but we 

don’t have everything in common)

were professional belly-dancers

and teachers; but they could never 

teach me, though they tried – I don’t 

have the flexible midriff, the nimble feet.

8. 

‘Work,’ said the hymn, 

‘for the night is coming.’

I always heard it as, ‘Dance –

for the night is coming.’ 

When you come to the end

of your life, be that early

or late, maybe there’ll be

Heaven, maybe Hell, or simply 

nothing. No matter. I want to 

have danced while I was here.

9.

The dancing 

of fingers over keyboard

of words in my mind,

the music

of sounds and rhythms,

the play of ideas –

 

poetry compensates

for all my lack 

of dance,

of song.

10.

Gene Kelly in the rain;

Fred Astaire up walls

and across the ceiling;

Ginger Rogers with 

that smile, that hair;

Cyd Charisse with her

long, perfect legs;

Debbie Reynolds

and Mitzi Gaynor,

perky sweet …

(Number 9 is a textu.)

See also Poems 1-5, Poems 11-15 and Poems 16-20.

The whole sequence is now available as a free ebook. To access it (and others) first go here.