Dance

The violinist weaves a melody with fluid fingers.

A woman in the first row raises her arms and draws
shapes in the air, limbs swaying in melodic breeze.
She dances, shouts with abandon, exclaims her delight.

The tutti returns: energy and excitement rise from the orchestra,
roll across the stage, cascade into the audience
and crest at her seat. She whoops.

They escort her out at intermission.

We sit in silence until the finale, glaring at whisperers,
agitated by toe-tappers, seat-beaters,
poorly-timed applauders.

We rise, not to dance to the music,
but to leave – orderly – at the end.

Look at the Colors

We board the car reserved for women;
body parts you’d uncover in desert heat
cloaked behind long sleeves and high necklines.
Our pale faces and exposed hair reveal
all anyone need know about us.

Mothers, daughters, sisters
pack the compartment.
My young traveling companion
widens her eyes, trapped.

Look at the colors, I whisper.

Brown is the most pervasive hue:
cinnamon-cocoa skin, arched eyebrows.
Headwraps of rainbow jiggle
in the back-and-forth toss.

Look at the colors.

Bark-colored eyes cool and crinkle,
cheeks warm to bronze,
eggshell white appears between rosy lips,
blooms against the car’s moss interior.

Look at the colors.

Nancy Whitecar is a professional pianist and music teacher living in the Bay Area, California. Nancy’s poetry has been published by Burningword, Stick Figure, Loud Coffee Press, and A&U Magazine, which nominated her poem Punch Line for a Pushcart prize. Her short stories have appeared in The MacGuffin and in Ember: A Journal of Luminous Things. Nancy has also published choral music for young singers. She’s listening to jazz or Beethoven at home, when she’s not hiking and camping with her husband.