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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
LA GITANA, by JOHN CURTIS UNDERWOOD Poet's Biography First Line: None of the girls of ronda have feet as fine as mine Last Line: Master and man and the bravest heart, sultan and slave and mate. Subject(s): Dancing & Dancers | |||
None of the girls of Ronda have feet as fine as mine, That glimmer and glance through the whirl of the dance as fireflies blaze and shine, Seen in some shadowy rambla outside of a gay cafe. None of the girls in Ronda can dance down death, my way. Carmen and fat Conchita can sell themselves for shoes, Black as their souls with the heels of red, such as the Cubans use. They can sell themselves for their stockings, their spider webs of silk, And their feet like their brows are brazen, but mine are white as milk. For mine was a Northern mother my gypsy father found In a brothel in Biscaya. And love in drink he drowned. So I grew up in the gutter, slinking and wild to be Alone, alive, in the open, sunlit, and flushed and free, Naked in running rivers. So I must dance to-day Where the eyes of the men are upon my face and flesh like beasts of prey. And the tongues of the tawdry women they tear my life apart And they smear my name with their women's shame as their teeth would tear my heart, As they'd rip the flesh away from my face and the bodice from my breasts. And the wave of life is around me. I am lifted on its crests. I am lifted high on its surges; and the light it lends my eyes Is the strength of moon and sunrise and the splendor of the skies. I am caged in their snarling city, but between its shadowy bars I see the loom of to-morrow and the altar lights of stars. Savage, violent, virgin; like a trainer in their cage, They snarl at my looks like lashes, these women marred with age, These men that my mind has mastered; and I rule their restless lives With my feet that flicker through shadows like the bickering light of knives. I dance and they bow before me. Barefoot I turn, I tread On the throbbing hearts of the living and the ashes of the dead. I dance till I stop, where he stands apart, till I hold his love and hate: Master and man and the bravest heart, sultan and slave and mate. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...FAMED DANCER DIES OF PHOSPHORUS POISONING by RICHARD HOWARD ROSE AND MURRAY by CONRAD AIKEN A DANCER'S LIFE by DONALD JUSTICE DANCING WITH THE DOG by SUSAN KENNEDY SONG FROM A COUNTRY FAIR by LEONIE ADAMS THE CHILDREN DANCING by LAURENCE BINYON A SENIOR'S PLEA by JOHN CURTIS UNDERWOOD |
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