Love Poem: Dance
Emanuel Carter Avatar
Written by: Emanuel Carter

Dance

DANCE

Daily he watched her
a vigil of desire masked
by the suit, by the business
demeanor of the corporate 
nineties, a faint tambourine
tingling the spine, kindling
a rhythm at the edge of
the mind
Daily he watched her
walking at lunch hour, bathed
in the sunlight denied other
women in the tepid, a-sensual
theater of our times
And the congas were playing
a clear primal rhythm, the 
tambourine tingling the nerves
in the spine

One day he heard them
a murmur, a rumble
a great thunder growing like a 
sonic volcano erupting from
soul to the center of the brain
Cymbals and snare drums,
tablas and tars, derboukas and
tom-toms, and timpani rising,
rich polyrhythms like adrenalin 
and cunning somehow arming the
predator, the wild naked dancer
whirling and leaping with
flashing gold earrings and clicking
bone necklace as powerful
percussion destroyed inhibitions,
ignited the heat in the primitive 
focus of his hunting and stalking
the Circean woman whom he 
boldly pursued on airborne desire
as the fire of the drummers
burned hot in the city like flames
from the sun renegade in
the streets