THE FIRST DREAM

This is a re-write

The First Dream

He wanted, first, to be a dancer.
No!, I speak wrongly! he wanted

to be The Dance, to be through his body
a mural of shapes, motion and beats,
to write a rhythm of graffiti,
geometric, abstract, instant,
in the spaces of the eye.

But he lived in a denim, testosterone
world, truck drivers, pile drivers, brick pilers,
meat packers, bone crackers, wife smackers-
acceptable arts, boozing, boxing, bowling,
the only manly movement meters, wedding

waltzes, foxtrots and polka-vigor stomps-
no mentors here, of beauty over balls.

And he already a suspect child.