Clubbing.
It begins with shackling necklaces across throats:
the distorted custom of wearing amulets to battle
talismans to war; we are new hunters, wear jeans
to camouflage, clutch mobile phones like spears
journey for the village / town / city square, meet
the rest of the tribe mostly in short skirts, armed
with stilettos, armoured by Chanel. Dusk thickens,
the customary bickering between us commences
through the jungle vines of power lines/stampede
of zebra crossings/night growth of streets bustling,
our ritual is natural, till the traders come. Greater
armed, they divide with such ease that most of us
are taken. Those who resist are swayed by liquor
deals, sailed to darkness where the master spins
a tune not our own. We move stiffly to it as minds
force indifference, but spines have a preference
for drums. Rage building, we make our melody,
fight to find our feet until the master tries to mix
our movement with his song… but the rhythm is
uneven and the tempo, wrong. Against its waves,
we raise voices in anger, fists in protest, dancers
in the tide, militant against the music, a million
men marching through seas. But we still know
how to cross water, the ocean holds our bones;
explains our way of navigating past bouncers
like breeze into the cool air, where clouds pass
like dark ships and find us beached, benched
with parched lips, loose-limbed and looking
to light. Now, the best thing about clubbing
is not this, or the struggle to make hips sway
just so, not the need to charge cloakrooms
as if through underground railroads. No.
best thing about clubbing is the feeling
of freedom on the ride home.