The Dancers Poem by jan oskar hansen

The Dancers


Went to a dancing competition, but little did
I know it was naked dancing by grotesque
old people, the audience, all young, laughed
violently, great fun this, till their faces
became a mask of horror, when realizing they
were looking at their own future.

Someone pointed a finger at me and shouted
“he is old.” and hundred hands began pushing
me to the dance floor and tearing off my suit,
but I was able to jump out of an open window
were I landed in a stream five fathom deep, of
tears that had forgotten why they had cried,
and crocodile tears shed at gravesides;

I drank it all went back to the window spewed
it over the shameless old people who had let go
of their dignity in pursuit of eternal youth, and
fled into the woods. Torchlight, barking dogs
and angry voices: Get him, he isn’t a democrat
wants to stop us having innocent fun, would
have been a good nazi, string him up.”

Pale sunrise, still- life- forest- a deer grazes
in the clearing, suddenly it jumps in the air,
a red rose is born on its chest, and as a single
rifle shot echoes amongst trees, a day begins.