Froth

She just wanted to dance

Even without music, she’d lose herself in the motion and emotion
Her dancing was the music, her body the instrument
And there was only one job for her in this anachronistic, one road, wasteland

Dancing for men
Men with wives who couldn’t do better
Men trying to recapture verility or prove it never left
The kind of men who froth hyperbolically of former conquests and self-percieved prowess
Regaling their ilk with vainglorious almosts and rageful if-onlys
Again and again

She couldn’t see them from the stage
They were hidden behind the diaphanous sheet of pungent smoke and the one-way mirror protecting her fragility

The howls and cat calls, the subtle suggestions and outright offers were directed at her, as much as to their own starving egos

No matter
She couldn’t hear them either
She learned, many years ago, to just hear the music

Her music drowned out the vitriolic bile, secretive desire, and drunken apologies of an abusive father
The acidic whispers and unsurprising deceit of jealous girlfriends
And the pressurized come-ons of their zealous, couldn’t-do-better boyfriends
…whose apple trees now whistle at the legal, little bird

She danced to get away from this petri dish, forever her home

To bide her time
To survive another day
And another night

She just needed to dance