I Dance

I’m a little bit stiff

my back not so used to bending 

my body used to spending 

hours pretending 

to meet some unending need to display propriety

constricted by tight hips 

the only thing that moves freely are my lips 

see  I’m a great talker 

but I hate talking 

I love words 

but I prefer expression without them

Yes,

I want to tell you how I’m feeling

But I’d rather let the gentle plucking of strings 

give me little wings 

that lift me 

just momentarily defying gravity

then, you would know that I’m happy 

or that I’m not

see before they were words, my thoughts were streamers, 

coloured beams of light that I saw even without sight

they would intertwine 

and move in the black backdrop on my mind 

my body would follow blindly and somehow

that’s where I learned to understand myself

in the ineffable, 

the only feel-able

in the varied, vague forever changing movements 

life, I learned, is just a series of movements

where we interlace 

while we reject and we face people, moments, truths 

back and forth

back and forth

spinning, flipping, arms flailing, legs lifting 

I once dreamed of being a dancer 

embodying the ever changing rhythms of the world 

even in my stillest moments 

whether I drift across the floor 

or move in only increments

feeling every ligament as my shoulders rise and descend

each drum beat released an old anxiety deceased 

every melody a different memory 

with every tradition embodied an inhibition dissipates

and affirmation take its place 

in my mind I am dancer 

but in the absence of physical flexibility 

and perhaps submission to those displays of propriety 

I’ve trained my words to dance for me

to tiptoe and 

tread slow, 

then explode off of stages 

and pages, 

out of cages  

conveying my greatest victories and  deepest rage 

I can’t back bend but I can bend words 

vocabularies and vernaculars all serve 

my need to bleed every emotion that occurs 

can you see them dancing 

freeing those streamers through my stream of consciousness

maybe it makes no sense 

but maybe it doesn’t have to 

maybe you just take it in

let yourself go in the trance 

and take what you will 

from this dance