I Am the American Negro (collection)/Dancing Gal

DANCING GAL
Black and tan—yeah, black and tan
Spewing the moans of a jigtime band
What does your belly crave?

A brown-sugar brown
Slim gal sways
Pretzel twisting
Beneath a yellow thumb
Of steel-stiff light
Amid a striped rain
Of red-note, blue-note

Jazz-hot jazz
Gazelle graceful
Lovely as a lover’s dream
Silken skinned, stillwater soft
Young girl breasts in gold encased
Scant gold around her lower waist
Red lips parted
Dark eyes flashing
She dances
Dips, whirls, undulates
Her body a living chord
Set loud and sweet
Against the bitter quiet
Of drab and muted human shapes

I see a long lean god
Standing in painted splendor
Motionless in the scented air
Of Tanganyika
I see a frozen idol
Set free from a single stone
Shielding with seven arms
His world in Hindustan . . .
Africa's madness, India's sadness
Wedded in Chicago
By a Midwest gal
In a Jew's cafe . . .

Black and tan—yeah, black and tan
Drenched in the jazz of a swingtime band
Is this what your belly craves?