In Defense of Dancing
Apr 2, 2012·Tap to summarize
Photo courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons. Tonight, they leave the curtains open, the lights on. From kitchen to living room, they dance. Two women, bent with years, sway in the orbit of a Bach sonata. They move like this, as if nothing could be wrong with the ache to elevate, two bodies coming so close—a single breath warms between their lungs. They dance. They dip and gyrate—the record warping as each note spins its own blasphemy, each crescendo shined into climax. Look how they are reckless in this taming of gravity, spilling in and out of duende. And should she place on the other’s ear the white lily perfected with memory, her hands, in their need to keep from falling, find comfort in the waist no man has troubled— but should, also, in this nightmare the neighbors look in with terror crushed on their faces, some saint’s name fogging the window, fists pounding the door, the sound of a match lifting the hiss from an oiled torch, and should in this nightmare, there be no nation under God, but only this house with its one lit window threatening joy, should two women, full of nothing but heat and metronomes, begin to seal what’s left of I love you between their lips—tell me you will not forget your faith in heartbeats, you who are human and must falter in the presence of such beauty, tell me you have dreamed of lifting your left foot closer to flight, that you, too, would die happiest by music, by drowning in the mouth that swallows—gladly—your song. Listen: Your browser does not support the audio element.Click here for the mp3.
