If... Tango
16th October 2009
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are doing ganchos and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all women doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being ignored, don't deal in indifference
Or being cabaceod, but miss the eyes,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can tango - and not make flashy moves your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Trad and Nuevo
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear Biagi, Lomuto, Villoldo
Twisted by electronico to make a beat for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
Stoop, tie your laces and dance again in wornout shoes:
If you can make one heap of all your leanings
And risk it on one turn of colgada-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To make your turn long after they are gone,
And hold your partner when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on!'
If you can dance in crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the line of dance,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving two minutes
And Forty seconds' with a touch of musicality -
Yours is the Milonga and every tanda in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Milonguero my son!
- BorderTangoMan, 16th October 2009