She dances alone,
the black child
in the yellow dress.
Alone amongst
the black and white oxfords,
the ivory Buster Browns,
the brown penny loafers
with smiling Abe Lincoln’s
looking up to her
from the confines
of their penny keepers.
Her white socks touch
the polished mahogany
hopping silently to
the beats of Chuck Berry
and Johnny B. Goode
She imagines hearing
her name in the lyrics:
Go go go
Go Joanie go go go
Go Joanie go go go
Go Joanie go go go
Go Joanie go go go
Joanie B. Goode.
She is loose but precise,
careful not to leave a mark,
correcting every footfall
with the more perfect
ballerina form
she saw once in
a Moira Shearer feature,
the one where the dancer
dies in the final act.
In the background she hears
the white throng under the
blue and white stripe panels
of the Republic Theater
dance to their own rules
a mess of governance that
obeys its own inane logic.
But then not one of them
had to sneak in through
the backstage door
when her brother, Marcus
chickened out at the first
“nigger” spited his way,
denying Joanie
even the indignity
of a colored only entrance.
At the still point
between the lyrics Joan
finds the real dance,
the one intent on hiding
a choreography of grief,
a sadness, a defiance
she shares only
with her shadow.
She imagines herself
a joyous, living, wondrous
thing at play,
a girl reborn into a woman,
a dancer over America.
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