Dimitri Dances

Sultry July day
Berlin scorches.
I'm on Alex; weave my way
through a sea of bronze-brown skin
suncapped children like bright flowers
leaf-hands catch you, telling what they see.
Trinkets jingle
love in gingerbread
sweat-pretzel-coffee air.

Teenagered fortress of lemonade crates
Seats for shows: gaudy hoops
Spin, scarlet skirted men
speak staccato. Silly-
still we linger, Fest-atmosphere
paints us blazing on the vibrant scene.

I rise. New strange music pulls
over tramline threshold.
Black demarcates the stage
people half-attentive
thoughts on ice-cream, on finding shade
heat-forced inactivity.
Thin man, gypsy-dark, tarpaulin blue
You see me
I see you.

Crystal orbs
traverse your human plain
cool water globes, enchanted all
never waver, never let them fall.
One, two, four, more,
encircling, rolling, flying
from a carefree limb, flick
spin. In glass
sun glitters-
it is not this which dazzles.

Brittle sweat-sheened limbs
crumple-
Heartbeat
and you curl, foetal, enwombed,
fragile, sunshined, swoon
But life's rhythm pounds
ribs heave; you arch, you sway
pure joy in your art. Thirty you could be
or five hundred; your smile though
of a child
sharing pleasure with the world.

Hypnotised
ground burns, dare not breathe
for fear to break the spell.
Eyes level
Gazes connect
sphere-arced
draw me in, inexorable thread
caught in your lissom web.

Dark conjuror
enfold me in your phantom arms
nebulous light, take me far from here.
Transcend language with your demon-angel eyes.

Blink- dreams pass,
and once more you are mortal,
moth-brown, thread broken, spheres stilled.
Sweet reaper- one thin hand
extends the prosaic beggar's cap.

Dimitri
You are life itself dancing death
How can I condense
Everything I feel into words, into coins?
Futility of praise; I try, you understand.
'Berlin Lacht', the chalk declaims,
and today, conversely,
so do we.