Spirit Of The Dancer
Swirling impression
Of African handmaiden
Bowing her dusky limbs
Bowing her dusky limbs
Bowing in celebration of manacles unclasped
Beneath the stony gaze of her spirit father.
Daughter of the Diaspora
Quaking like taken
With fever
Beads of sweat
Beads of sweat
Beads of coral
Slip and shake between brown mounds of fecundity
To tribal beats calling her homeward,
Where spirit sisters share space
Speak of betrayal
Speak of betrayal
Speak of searing pain
Cutting deep into
Twisted bowels of
The psyche.
Undressed feet
Make a syncopated duet
With shrill war cries of
The dasheikèd drummer
With hands counting the cycle of his people
Stamping out the pain
Stamping out the pain
Stamping out the evil
Of those with a little knowledge
And a double dose of fear.
Splayed fingers
Express spirit
Locked deep
Now loose
In each one of us now
Grasping the message
Grasping the message
Grasping the life-fire of hope
Cauterising the links of black and white.
Multi coloured arch
Softly suspended in the sky
Forms the backdrop to the movement mosaic
And another reminder of ancestry
His nostrils flaring
His nostrils flaring
His nostrils detecting
The bittersweet scent of victory
Shed in the land.
Copyright © 1998 Sandra E. Morris
*inspired by 1999 Emancipation Day celebrations at the Bussa statue in Barbados.
This was also performed in Martinique accompanied by drumming and dance chereographed by award-winning Alvin Ailey trained Kelvin Carvahlo.
**published in: Urban Entertainment Magazine, Bloomfield, Connecticut Uemagazine@aol.com & www.sisterfriends.com
©2000 - 2008 Individual Authors of the Poetry. All rights reserved by authors.
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