Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Bill & Fred

Shoes with wooden taps                            Shoes with metal taps
Body erect but fluid
                                                                   Head held high arms moving
Like the irish clogger       
                                                                   Like the ballroom dancer
Who was my friend
                                                                   That I also am
Sounds exquisite                                        Sounds exquisite
Moves smooth and I smile                           Moves smooth and I smile
Bone jangler they called me
                                                                   Dapper, ever the aristocrat
Dignified, but still the servant
I play my parts                                            I play my parts
Perfectly and dance                                   Perfectly and dance
With a little white girl
                                                                   With beautiful white women
A man in his fifties I dance                         A man in his fifties I dance
                                                                   Seen in top hat and tails
Seen the way they want to see me


Note: In the 1936 film, "Swing Time," Fred Astaire paid tribute to Bill Robinson in the dance number "Bojangles from Harlem."

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