Theater & Dance

After the second conference, I would be cast in the role of a young dancer with a prestigious New York City ballet company. I would be cast in the role of the mother, a former dancer now amateur artist, whose career ended at 28 when she became pregnant. I would be cast in the role of the exotic beauty who is more in touch with her sensuality. I would be cast in the role of the director, a cruel and demanding genius who would sleep with the ingenue. I would be cast in the role of someone selected to compete for the part alongside several other dancers.

I wait for my shadow to forget me,
to take that one phantom step that I keep
from taking. I wait for the simple flash
of a dancer's spat upon this one moon
of stage-light, the mind's lonely oval
illuminated on the surface of some
windless pond or slew. And the old soft-shoe
practices to get it right, husha-husha-hush
in its constant audition of sawdust.
Even this choreography of useless
wishing is not enough to keep tonight
from becoming nothing more than some floor's
forgotten routine where faded, numbered

What never comes when called.
What hides when held.
Guest
most at home where least
expected. Vagrant
balm of Gilead.
What, soon as here,
becomes
the body’ s native ground and,

November wind. The feeling of knowing
something before you said it, all over everything.
As in, shadow take me into the side of the mountain.
As in, open up the earth and get inside.
Leaving doesn't mean much. Arriving
means everything, how you came to be where you were,
even if later it will hurt to think of it.
And the forgotten, aren't they always
the most remembered elsewhere, before they perish,
when someone has their eye on them,
and later when the shrines are made
with local flowers and icons of heroes, roses

Spaces in the electric air divide themselves
in circular rhythms, as the slender
grace of your arms and bell-tied ankles
describe a geometric topography, real, cosmic,
one that once reverberated continually in
a prescribed courtyard of an ancient temple

in South India. As your eyelids flit and flirt, and
match the subtle abhinaya in a flutter
of eye-lashes, the pupils create an
unusual focus, a sight only ciliary muscles
blessed and cloaked in celestial kaajal
could possibly enact.

A cooler
head of lettuce prevailed, but when the actor
asked his question and paused
for us to watch him pause and think
inside the pause, I almost answered
as if we were in a bar, just the two of us
and a balcony and spotlight. The two of us
and programs and makeup and a sofa
from the director’ s living room and the black/
womb/agora/séance of theater inviting us to feel
together alone. I recall I don’ t recall
the question but its scope on his face

Water spurts incredibly
Clear up under simple feel
And that is how
We drank water

american indian
outside the guthrie
forever wounded
by tributes
high western
movie mockery
decorations
invented names
trade beads
federal contracts
limps past
the new theater

wounded indian
comes to attention
on a plastic leg
and delivers
a smart salute
with the wrong hand

precious children
muster nearby
theatrical poses
under purple
tapestries
castles
and barricades
on stage
with reservation plans

Gotta love us brown girls, munching on fat, swinging blue hips,
decked out in shells and splashes, Lawdie, bringing them woo hips.

As the jukebox teases, watch my sistas throat the heartbreak,
inhaling bassline, cracking backbone and singing thru hips.

Like something boneless, we glide silent, seeping 'tween floorboards,
wrapping around the hims, and ooh wee, clinging like glue hips.

Engines grinding, rotating, smokin', gotta pull back some.
Natural minds are lost at the mere sight of ringing true hips.

as i fly over this time
rising over only this
so much painted suffering
unseen grimaces and stares
among spruce greens
these few forests left
all of us trying to be alone
quiet and blind.
*
i see soldiers in bus stations
with colored names
polaroid shots
their girlfriends chew gum
smile wide
*
in all this silver of sky
like stars these wheels
car gears lampshades
electrical refuse
zen oiled and greased