Can you interpret this poem?

Question

THE HARLEM DANCER

by: Claude McKay (1890-1948)

APPLAUDING youths laughed with young prostitutes
And watched her perfect, half-clothed body sway;
Her voice was like the sound of blended flutes
Blown by black players upon a picnic day.
She sang and danced on gracefully and calm,
The light gauze hanging loose about her form;
To me she seemed a proudly-swaying palm
Grown lovelier for passing through a storm.
Upon her swarthy neck black, shiny curls
Profusely fell; and, tossing coins in praise,
The wine-flushed, bold-eyed boys, and even the girls,
Devoured her with their eager, passionate gaze;
But, looking at her falsely-smiling face
I knew her self was not in that strange place.

Answer 1

I would assume it is referring to a cabaret dancer or something. I don't know what you mean by interpret. She has the crowd in the palm of her hand, yet she's still empty inside. Maybe she wants respect, or to be understood she's more than a body.

I really don't know, but that would be my guess.

Answer 2

The woman was GOD at what she did. She knew how to move, how to dress, how to act, in order to make her living. But no matter how much she smiled and played her part in the game, SHE knew that she despised herself for having to degrade herself in order to make her living by pleasuring young men and women.

BB,
Raji the Green Witch

Answer 3

same as the other comment deffinetly shes a stripper but the authour seems to see something in her eyes like most strippers there mind is else where