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Doing the twist on nails

When you throw your dancing shoes out, back over your shoulder,
 
And lose yourself, you find yourself twisting on the stage,
 
dancing,
 
dancing,
 
dancing,
 
let that pink boy whip you around—I can tell you:
 
Life doesn’t dance this way—
 
That way dances death.
 
Thighs
 
shoulders
 
breasts:
 
they’re all in it!
 
Inside you, dead drunk,
 
wheezes of air are dancing.
 
Somebody else’s ring
 
dances on your hand,
 
And your face by itself
 
doesn’t dance at all
 
Flying, lifelessly, above all the body's life
 
Like a mask taken off your dead head.
 
And this stage—
 
is only one part of that cross
 
On which they once
 
crucified Jesus;
 
The nails shot through to the other side, and you began
 
To dance on them,
 
sticking out.
 
And you dance
 
On the nails
 
nails
 
On scandals red as rust
 
on the thorn-points of tears: Listen,
 
Because I once loved you, tiresomely, gloomily,
 
I also hammered the crooks of my nails into this stage.
 
Ah, bestial, beastly music,
 
do you keep on getting stronger?
 
No one can see the blood
 
ooze from your foot-soles
 
To wash the steps with clean water,
 
I’d rather you’d do it, Mary Magdalene.
 
not Jesus.
 
I’ll wash all their days, their yesterdays, not like a brother would
 
For a sister
 
but like a sister for a sister.
 
I’ll kneel down and pick up your feet
 
And hold them quietly, and with kisses try to do something
 
About their wounds.

 
 
Dance Poetry
A comprehensive anthology
Edited by Alkis Raftis
Copyright 2012

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