Rita Dove
“American Smooth”
We were dancing—it must have
been a foxtrot or a waltz,
something romantic but
requiring restraint,
rise and fall, precise
execution as we moved
into the next song without
stopping, two chests heaving
above a seven-league
stride—such perfect agony,
one learns to smile through,
ecstatic mimicry
being the sine qua non
of American Smooth.
And because I was distracted
by the effort of
keeping my frame
(the leftward lean, head turned
just enough to gaze out
past your ear and always
smiling, smiling),
I didn’t notice
how still you’d become until
we had done it
(for two measures?
four?)—achieved flight,
that swift and serene
magnificence,
before the earth
remembered who we were
and brought us down.
In Rita Dove’s,
American Smooth she illustrates the
narrator’s delicate rheumatic passion for ballroom dancing. Rita Dove and her
husband Fred Viebahn began dancing after their house burned down after it was
struck by lightning. To get their mind off of the bizarre tragedy, their
neighbors invited them to a benefit dinner, where the couple saw other couples
engaging in ballroom dancing. Rita and her husband always interested in
learning how to dance, and signed up for introductory classes after the dinner.
The couple has been ballroom dancing ever since. In an interview, Rita Dove
states that “Though there's nothing like a jazzy fox-trot to combine both the
Western and the African American traditions, and the quickstep is essential if
you want to feel both light and swift, I prefer the Latin dances-cha-cha,
rumba, mambo-but samba is my favorite. That dance has sass! And it's
terrifically difficult to do well, because for all that wriggling and grinding,
it demands tremendous restraint. Coiled energy, grace, and punch-just like
poetry.” Along with a dancing background, Rita Dove also has experience in
playing the cello which also influences the lyricism in her poetry. Dove’s
poems that are inspired for her love for dance is written in the technique of
the dance performed in the poetry. While writing American Smooth “The gradual lowering from tiptoe that one executes
in the second half of the third beat in the waltz-only then did "American Smooth" start to shimmer
into being. My scaffolding was to provide a humble description of the dance
technique-what each part of the body should be doing, measured out precisely,
without emotion-in the hopes of finding the poem's true desire, to achieve
flight of consciousness, a lifting of the spirit as well as of the human form.
The political implications of the American brand of smooth has suggested, in
turn, different avenues to pursue in other poems that are not printed here.”
The overall essence of American Smooth portrays the importance of in spite of
any obstacles that may come to an individual it is important to keep a “good
poker face”. American Smooth clearly
correlates Rita Dove’s musical and dance background while also showing the
audience that it is okay to decline societal conformities. 
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