the same dance

we are dancing the same dance, but at very different speeds

me standing on Daddy’s feet, five years old, at the van Renterghems’ New Year’s Eve party (oh and the grownup tables at my eye height as I wandered the room, the pig with its frilly skirt and apple in its month, us miniature Baptists telling jokes about Catholics, what did we know)

we are dancing the same dance, but to such different music

you send me messages and there is never a ding or a buzz,

just randomly later I glance over and there are your words, floating

we are dancing such a different dance to this same old music

will we ever find ourselves dancing it together?

Marjy and me on our untrained tiptoes, fat Belgian lady at the piano, tiny Belgian girls in their bathing suits leaping across the floor

Mommy and Ruthy and me in the living room, put your little foot, all of us on the cracked tennis court, square dances on records, Uncle Jerry shooing away the little kids, won’t you dance with me honey tuck your toes in tight!

I thought we were all dancing the same dance

I thought we were dancing the same dance, but look at your feet and look at mine

I thought we were dancing in the same room, but we’re decades apart

that pig in its little frilly skirt, eye to my eye

modern dance in the Multi-Purpose Room, Valerie teaching us negative space, write a report on the movement of the fruit as it drops into the fruit salad bowl

aerobic dance in the Multi-Purpose Room, Brenda teaching us points, warmup situps to Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover, rows of us on those sweaty blue mats

I thought we were still dancing

always dancing

I thought we were

maybe it was just me

when the music stops, does everyone just go home?

is that why everything’s empty?

you never know which tune is going to

get somebody dancing

you never really know

what tune is playing in their head