One Night at Zula Bar in Cape Town

I’m dancing,

             I’m dancing more

                          I’m dancing more than I ever danced.

More than I danced at my cousin’s wedding,

more than I danced on my  21^st Birthday

(which was a 70’s roller disco)

I drink Milk Stout beer

               at the Zula Bar

and dance with girls I won’t take home.

I haven’t slept in weeks,

but I’m still doing the shuffle with the 3am crowd.

It doesn’t matter how much I miss my sister

even though we’ve never danced in the same room.

Doesn’t matter that my dad won’t be alive by the time

          I understand him.

Doesn’t matter that I might be talking to Grandma’s gravestone

by the time I’m home.

Doesn’t matter that my entire family think I’m strange

and I think they are normal.

Doesn’t matter that I should have told Sophie the truth

that I didn’t want another person in my life that I could lose

                                                                  or let down.

Doesn’t matter that it’s 4am now

and behind me a girl is yelling

This music is so good it hurts!

and I’m dancing, dancing

like dancing is a kind of pain

and all I can do is

                             shake.

~ Raymond Antrobus

Raymond Antrobus is a poet and photographer, born and bred in Hackney. He is co-curator of Chill Pill and Keats House Forum. He has performed alongside authors and poets such as Margret Atwood, Michael Horovitz, Lemn Sissay, Benjamin Zephaniah and Kwame Dawes. Raymond appeared on series 5 of BBC Radio 4’s Bespoken Word. He has been performing poetry since 2007 and is the International Farrago Slam champion 2008, Anti-Slam Champion 2010, and Canterbury Word Slam Champ 2012. Raymond is currently piloting Europe’s first MA in Spoken Word Education, an extension of the Teacher / Writer Programme at Goldsmith’s University in London. His first pamphlet of poems can be purchased from Burning Eye Books.