Elegy Gitano

painting by sylvia zalmanson

Elegy Gitano

The young gypsy boy leaned against
the crumbling adobe wall, watching the police
march his family out of the abandoned apartment
they had been residing in, two husky villagers
in blue coveralls bricking up the door and windows;

until the gitanos appeared like pigeons in the square
and when the ring of Romani formed thick,
the boy knew it was time for the juerga,
the spontaneous spirited blues chanting
of the dispossessed;

in a strong clear soprano voice he began the cante
as a guitarist appeared from a darkened doorway
starting the togue, his strings vibrating with tears,
the words bloody and beautiful, joined

immediately by a father and son pummeling
their wooden box drums, as the cajon cadences
brought on the chorus of palmas, that pounding
twelve-beat cycle, dozens of hands clapping,

as Maria leaped into the center of the circle,
with her red-yellow-orange skirt whirling,
shaking finger bells, her golden shawl tied
around her shapely backside, throbbing
and ringing the tiny bells on her belt,
her flashing feet thundering on the cobblestones,

beginning the baile, continued by one woman
after another, young and old, singing the verses
they all knew about the purges, about Hitler,
Stalin, and Franco;

the three policemen got out of their patrol car,
the brick layers put down their busy trowels
as they joined in with the rising Andalusian beat,

and for a moment there were no oppressors,
no victims, just the dancing, chanting, and
the flama guitar rhythms spilling out
of the sad courtyard, rising, rising
toward the indifferent twilight beyond.

Glenn Buttkus

March 2012

Listed as #39 over at Magpie Tales 108
Listed as #21 over at dVerse Poets-OLN35

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