"dancefloors" poems
First things first
I'd like to apologise
I'm sorry I'm not the good Indian girl I was bred to be
I'm sorry I don't make round rotis
I'm sorry that the tongue I use to speak punjabi is broken and hides in my mouth unused until desperately needed
I'm sorry that I don't cook and clean efficiently enough to be wifey material
Sorry that I love who I love and don't hate who I was told to
Sorry that I can't follow gods blindly and not try to sneak back stage to see their shining gold adornments and blue body paints and multiple arms in full and bare glory and scandal
I'm sorry that I'm actually not sorry for any of this
I'm sorry that these are false and empty apologies
I am unapologetically whole
A human not just a race
A female not a trust fund or business transaction
I filter out the good parts of the culture I'm from and the ones I identify with
I'll wear docs under my saari no apologies
I'll grind on dancefloors and do the best Bhangra dance you'll ever see unashamedly
Hareems and hoodies
Bindies and pin up eyeliner
Hedonism and head in the clouds
My ambition is Ambedkar untouchable
My drive is a salt march surging silently non violently through cities
My hometown pride is built in concrete and rickshaw dust,
Prejudice and Bollywood lust
May 14, 2015
May 14, 2015 at 1:25 PM UTC
Lustful glances, from an empty heart,
Plenty of chances, she's a cheap ****
This dancefloors a graveyard,
Their dignity lies in shards,
I judge, yet I still take part,
I'm the joker in this pack of cards.
A subtle glance, from a beating heart,
Only one chance,for a brand new start,
This dancefloor's a pathway,
To more than just a ***** lay,
I'm nervous, yet still i take part,
Moments that keep lonliness at bay.
Feb 8, 2010
Feb 8, 2010 at 5:51 AM UTC
I should’ve had a hedonistic summer, a roundup of long, sun-kissed days and even longer, undulant, kissing nights.
There are no riviera pics this year - set against the blow-out backdrop of Saint Tropez or Heraclee - with their sunlit-deliriums, cracked plaster beach bars, aromatic trailing Jasmine, lavender, umbrella pines and baking Socca.
No nights of dense, optimistic nihilism on neon-painted open-air dancefloors, or gritty, underground raves, in dark, brick-clad, light-strobed basements.
And no timeless, sun-drenched, beachside early mornings, with their moments of stillness, beauty and reprieve.
Summer feels can’t be vicarious - you have to get out there and get ***** hmm, sandy anyway. Are there ethical implications to basking under a climate-crisis sun? Maybe, but if so, do we care?
Let’s wax poetic..
Summertime often sees us jetting off to different places.
*If I could travel anywhere
let it be outer-space
not floating in darkness,
for years and years
let’s find a better way.
I’ve traveled to the moon
- on a little friction -
that isn’t even science fiction.
I’ve traveled simply by turning pages.
It didn’t take fuel and it didn’t take ages.
That was travel at the speed of thought,
but better yet, let’s travel at the speed of sight
- that’s faster than light.*
.
.
Songs for this:
Relationships by HAIM
Summer Sun by Koop
Summer Girl (Bonus Track) by HAIM
Aug 25, 2025
Aug 25, 2025 at 10:57 AM UTC
In and out of doors but still so sure
Filling dancefloors you’re cool you’re pure
Facing collision with a new disposition and trying to maintain
That sometimes there is sun but mostly there is rain
Time is a not a concept I hear him creeping up. I turn I look him in the eyes and ask, “what’s up?”
“Nothing’s up I’m merely here and follow everyone but I’ve never followed anyone that’s like a loaded gun”
Peace and love are no reprieve with a heart upon your sleeve
Pull apart every stitch in time and lets weave
Now I’m king but still no queen I see her in my dreams
When I’m asleep she’s awake or so it seems
Words you see the notes will follow
Anticipate tomorrow
Never lend never borrow it only leads to being ****** off.
Bus stop and ***** shop suspicion makes you wanna
Start a good religion that everyone will folla
Scratch that I know nothing but the importance of feeling
Let the plan hatch that’s stirring then escape to leave them reeling
Feel so good didn’t know I could but enough about me
Lets celebrate the fact our eyes can see
Sure this road I woke upon does pierce the horizon
I bet though when I get there anticlimax is the poison
The nowhere groove down which I move presents itself in fact
It's a necessary evil with which I’ve made my pact
Suddenly, so long, release!
The wasted days and lonely weeks
Chances change we come of age and crash through an oasis
Places people just don't know
Scared and scolded as we go
This is this we’re meant to go
Deep inside I just don’t know
Rain it falls as twilight calls last orders on this game of old
Back to chances, only fear, your chances live and die right here.
Sep 10, 2013
Sep 10, 2013 at 12:39 PM UTC
the love and romance.
the years lit by artillery.
the wars.
the men did these wild things. these great grand expressions of love and survival.
they’d damage themselves, bleed while moving furniture.
wood splinters better painted red wet warmth.
they’d notch together plum-cut bricks into
crenulations or walls or cathedrals.
home built.
the women: of an ancient woven fiber
and/or old energy, they’d battle serpents into dark and drunk loneliness.
she conspired for a happy life.
death by the meadow.
old woman remembering young woman and
young man,
now old man approaching.
the world forgets, but we will always have eachother.
remember us youths in proto-revolution.
we didn’t believe in what we did.
we lived a lie.
all america.
dreaming and soap opera.
daytime television blastulas.
the wars are fought early, and fierce.
the wars are won and lost on highschool dancefloors.
highschool blacktops. blackboards. breathy
kissing.
spectral codes of light.
and we bloom outward into livelihoods and
incomes.
timelines.
trenches to crawl from shell-shocked and screaming ****** ******
or not.
but yes -
the world is built on blisters and scar tissue.
nothing is untouched.
nothing is unwounded.
Jul 15, 2014
Jul 15, 2014 at 3:50 AM UTC
When I was younger
I had this idea of love
As being a prewritten script
I’d spot you on the dancefloor
Our eyes would meet
You would smile
I would smile
We would dance the night away
All of a sudden you would have to leave
It’s okay though
You would leave your slipper
That way I could return it
So that you could be my princess
What I didn’t know is that dancefloors aren’t meant for lovers
Or that your eyes would be like medusas
Turning my soul to stone
And that when you left
You shoe would stay on your foot
Leaving me with an idea of love when I was a little older
Love was my dad in the navy
My mom the traveling nurse
Meeting in Hawaii
Getting married in a church
Her waiting while he was away
They’d love each other forever
After all, they had me.
But sometimes mom and dad fight
And sometimes mom and dad cry
Because let’s face it
Mom and dad had this idea of love
When they were younger
And this wasn’t what they had in mind
When I was a teenager i had this idea of love
She had freckles and green eyes
One half Irish
One half Indian
She had all of my heart
She told me to write down my feelings
And to trust in love
Love way talking on the phone till 2am
And holding hands in public
But no one told me that love could have a father
And that sometimes dads drink
And go missing for a few days at a time
Or that love could leave for 6 weeks
And that talking on the phone till 2am
Could turn into never sleeping
Because love wasn’t there
No one had warned me that love’s letters sometimes have misspellings
And that when love returns home she wouldn’t feel the same
And she never did
Four years later
Sometimes I think about love
But not too much
I am kind of done pretending
Mar 28, 2016
Mar 28, 2016 at 8:46 PM UTC
Everyday is a new day
Completely fresh. We all wake to the same sun. We all hope for peace, yet we crave chaos. We are searching for love under the same moon just different dancefloors. Different drink portions. We all hurt but some of us hurt more. Some people shoot for their dreams while others wander and wonder why, why the sun doesn't shine on them as much as it does others. Why they are left in the shadows. Why is it when music plays it moves their hearts but not their body. Left standing , crying on that fluorescent dance floor, lights flashing around them. Maybe they drank too much but it never feels like enough. Satisfaction is something that comes in small fractions. They want to rest. Water floods their eyes. Crying in the shower, hurting every hour. Sometimes they sit in the dark and just stare at time. It ticks in their face and pesters their brains. They can't keep pace and It's testing them. They want to feel safe. You want to feel safe. You want the suns light, the moons calm. Internal pain, external rain. Interminable rain. You can't stop it. Life is growing darker and you cannot escape.
Feb 16, 2018
Feb 16, 2018 at 1:11 PM UTC
i'm always
in between places
encouraged to embrace new phases
been told that my tension is baseless
and if i'm so restless then maybe
i should rest more
forget the urge to explore and
try harder to be relaxed, or
acceptable, adorable,
but i swore that this turbulence would mean something
whether on dancefloors or in bookstores
i'd be there, carving out a slice of the world
to swallow whole and put gleaming eyes to work
healing old wounds covered over in moss and stones
sinew and muscle and skin so new that nobody who's hurt me
has ever touched it
i figure there's water in some places that can seep through tired bones and reach even
the smallest, longest-burning embers in my lungs that catch my breath sometimes
when i see an old photograph, or the at the smell of petrol
and sitting here means nothing more than coughing up ashes
so i'd like to know what sort of rest they think that is
i want to believe that the one place in this town untainted by trauma is somewhere i leave bluebells behind me with every footstep
then if i revisit i might be able to spot where my healing started
somewhere between there and starlight in june
or maybe it was underneath july's orange moon
or maybe it was after soaking my face in lightning storms on an august night
either way, whenever i've daydreamed about my life
this place wasn't what i had in mind
or dragged out for this amount of time
so perhaps all it means
is that my dreams remain untouched by clumsy hands
and i can still be charmed by fresh lands and familiar plans
and even if the restlessness never wanes
i still have the moonlight in my veins
until then all i have are grey skies and citalopram
and this place looks the same all year round
and nobody even notices ashes in the atmosphere
because everything turns to dust here
Aug 20, 2019
Aug 20, 2019 at 2:53 PM UTC