woman song

a composition without effort
flowed from full red lips
rising above the drum brush
high-hat, downbeat and strings,
soft reeds combine, and her deep wide eyes close
as her curled black hair slides
across bare brown skin, shoulders
that have carried so much for so long
and her delicate back shimmies
to the movement she has made.
I revive moments of joy and sadness
in the pauses of her soft inhales

the corridor showed signs of wear
and the incomplete blessing of skills,
repairs that smoothed away a slow torture of time
The old carpet seemed new
in the wet residue of a woman's effort
rub, clean shampoo, rub clean
and the sinews of her neck express
the giving from her inner form, she pants
low and slow; unbends the back
stiff and tired, her spirit reports, a call
from every aching part...smiling
as the guests pass by so carefree so
un-seeing, as she moans soft...bends again

In the corner room, laughter brings
signs of spring and hints of gathers
before sweet rain; transforms the sultry
heat of late August amid stirrings
 an ancient city in celebration
for the crisis points of an infant nation
all flow, across balcony doors. A window
on a world in flux.
From the deep smile beneath
her deeper furrowed brow the weight
that slips past her sensitive lips
and rises to the walls and floats down the hall
and begins again when skin denied for so long
rediscovers the genesis of woman song.

The sweetness of life, rustled on sheets
the needs of the moment past flowed to the blossom
of a wish...now filled, and another
and she is like the gentle breeze through linens,
she bends like tips of trees. gently 
whispers grow to rush and hush,
in counterpoint to her breathy rhythm
as love holds her close, in the velveteen air.