Winter Green
—Poems and Photos by Joyce Odam, Sacramento, CA
A SHADOW MOVING FROM THE WALL
After “Waltz” from The First Echelon by Dmitri Shostakovich
Fine piece of music—
hypnotic—
one might even want to
waltz,
alone or with another,
a shadow moving from the wall
onto the floor
into the swirling
where the dance seems not to end
until all the dancers tire and leave,
except for
one dark lady
holding on
to the shadow’s arm,
the echoes flowing through the wall.
_________________
DANCING THE TANGO
After Dancing in Colombia by Fernando Botero
Ah, Tango,
how free you make me feel,
how sensual—
exploiting
love’s intensity
with tease—
even
the voyeuristic mirrors
happy to watch us,
posturing
and challenging
the mystery of the Tango.
No Two Alike
THE DANCE
happy are
the dancers
who dance
to themselves
in the lure
of music
oh how
they bend
and sway
together
in delightful
intimacy
he whispers to
her turns her
around and
around till she
swoons against
him dizzily
his arm
is strong
his body tireless
for the dance
she follows
Emergent
DANCING TO THE MUSIC
Why does it hurt to lead
to follow
that whine of sweet blues
the musician's eye closed
upon the feeling
grown ill of love
two under the spell
blending and turning
transferred,
into one shadow
softly sharded
by a faceted globe—
no end to such a dance
it loves itself, it has the floor,
it has the spell
and the spellbound dancers
move like pain
together,
for the music,
which is long and jealous,
and needs their pain so it can cry.
Rain Crystals
DANCE OF THE WEB-FAIRY
After “The Fairies Are Exquisite Dancers”
by Arthur Rackham (1867-1939)
Once upon a dance, upon a thread of light
that stretched from stem to stem of leaf and
flower—oh—once upon a fairy tale, archaic
as a dream, upon a morning drenched with
meadow-dew—the ancient fairy—weightless
as a shadow, danced upon the dwindling
hour of the night, and the two lost children
woke, and smiled, and held each other.
_________________
DANCE OF THE SORROWING
DAUGHTERS
what a slow dance we do,
our mothers,
what a slow dance
in your honor
with what a soberness
do we music you
our bones ancestral
oh, Mothers,
with our reverent
bowing and turning
in the effort of our sorrow
to complete
our interpretation
of ourselves
what else can we do
but this
you gave us our beginning
oh, Mothers,
let us now begin you
(first pub. in Blue Unicorn, 1994)
Rain Maiden
TIME FOR THE WALTZ
The floor is deep in shadows
and we are transformed
by our new necessity.
I hear the first strains of music,
and it is weeping—weeping—
and we cannot bear it.
Once we were graceful
and knew how to dance.
But a waltz is difficult—
has smoothness and solemnity,
and we are so torn now,
and the door
is slowly opening to the night
with its moon and stars,
and the music is already
flowing outward
to the silence
that can’t wait to close after.
All has been said.
And the clock is ready to retire.
What is it we have forgotten?
The floor is deep in shadows
and we are transformed
by our new necessity.
I hear the first strains of music,
and it is weeping—weeping—
and we cannot bear it.
Once we were graceful
and knew how to dance.
But a waltz is difficult—
has smoothness and solemnity,
and we are so torn now,
and the door
is slowly opening to the night
with its moon and stars,
and the music is already
flowing outward
to the silence
that can’t wait to close after.
All has been said.
And the clock is ready to retire.
What is it we have forgotten?
Rumors
THE DANCE OF TIME
(A Balance Poem)
Now that we know the way the music goes
the dance of time is what we do;
the little steps we know
that are our own;
the way
we sway—
subside to moan
because time hurts us so;
the way we trust each other’s clue
as if each one the other really knows.
There’s more to this than random verse or prose
describing what we hurry through—
like tides that ebb and flow—
like undertone.
We say
the day
is still our own—
but its page turns, and oh,
we didn’t know there were so few.
And, still, the music keeps us on our toes.
___________________
Today’s LittleNip:
WALTZING TO SAD-TIME
—Joyce Odam
waltzing to sad-time
your arms slipping away
your smile fading
I am waltzing alone
___________________
Many thanks for all of Joyce’s poetry of dancing today, including her fine word pictures and the plant photos that she caught, just after the rain danced on them! Green, green, green! All this dancing is, of course, about our Seed of the Week, Dancing. Our new Seed of the Week will explore another of the arts: Painting. You’ll want to dig out some metaphors here, pull them out and dust them off. Send your poems, photos & artwork about this (or any other) subject to kathykieth@hotmail.com. No deadline on SOWs, though, and for a peek at our past ones, click on “Calliope’s Closet”, the link at the top of this column, for plenty of others to choose from.
For more about Botero’s Dancing in Colombia, see www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/1983.251/.
For more about the “Balance” poetry form, see poetscollective.org/poetryforms/the-balance/.
To hear the Waltz from Shostakovich’s The First Echelon, go to www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxjE0rX25og/.
And you can hear Claude Debussy’s The Fairies Are Exquisite Dancers (performed by pianist Anthony Tobin) at www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qdp9bDUsRk4/. Here is Arthur Rackham’s painting by the same name:
—Medusa, signing off with just a little bit more dancing:
Botero's Dancing in Colombia (“exploiting love’s intensity”)
Celebrate the poetry of the Tango!
Celebrate the poetry of the Tango!
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