Bruised Reed

[Image description: video - final scene from Pedro Almodóvar's Hable con Ella/Talk to Her; choreography by Pina Bausch; music by Bau.]

Bruised Reed

swaying sinuously

blown by the languorous melody

arms extend, arc and capitulate

touched by the melancholy breeze

outstretched limbs iterate

repeating once more

they gently oscillate

the curvaceous body

unto itself a beauty

motion and station merge

blurring the distinction

of æsthetic movement and form

another musical surge

muscles flex and stretch

effortlessly ostensibly

legs elongate

into a leap

land and pirouette

no resisting the pull

of unstoppable Clotho

the untiring Dance-Fate

*

she seduces still

tho’ flesh is now debased

an inexorable atrophy

via ailment, disease and disability

coursing pain

cannot extinguish

the desire to exist

in the moment

in the bend, the turn or spin

spontaneous synchronicity

still there is memory

torturous sometimes

pleasurable occasionally

of lithesome caprice

of physical pliancy

of life lived fully




Si el lector es hablante de español, puede que prefiera mi versión traducida.