Josephine



Josephine Baker in Berlin (1926)



Clothing’s optional
In a blink of time
trapped in between
Last night’s darkness
And oncoming demons
Discarding the old
Is far more fashionable
Where royalty lies dead
In the rubble but Josephine
Is flesh sweat and heat
She is raw see her twirl
Like her the rules strip down
To bare essentials
Just yesterday in Berlin
Surviving on wild turnips
Grown between the skeletons
Of buildings that rose again
And soon would crumble into dust
But that is later in the story
Watch the dark strip itself
Of the lightness of the silky
Transparencies revealing
Naked truths
To an orgasmic swelling
Pounded out by Weill
Sensuous smooth skin
She pulsates
All sex and wanting
While men's tongues savor
beer and nicotine
In the streets the beasts
Of many names fight
To be the boss of this town
Peasants simply want to live
Forgetting requires frolic
Reckless consumption and overt display
Breathe in the avante garde
Served succulent with two olives
A chaser after mustard gas
Frenzy-like create their art
Like young boys
Rushing to completion
Before the coming plague
And Josephine so beautiful
From America but so like them
Replacing carnage with carnal lust
If only for the blink of an eye
She is a wisp of freedom
Incarnate she bares all
And nothing
But nothing
Can touch
The sexual purity
Of her flesh.