Category Archives: the dance

Oct25

the geese, the spiral

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M.C. Escher “Day and Night”

Outside this morning with the dogs, and heard the geese from far far away.  Phalanxes of them, high then arcing into slow drifting circles disappearing into the mountain and then reappearing as the light struck their pale chests, and then spiraling, floating down onto the lake.

A second flock approached, and the  spiral downward toward the lake suddenly bloomed into another spiral and then another, each cancelling our the other until finally the whole group seemed to decide on a trajectory and disappeared over the crest.

I thought about spirals.  About DNA.  About the simple spiral of turning to look upward and over my shoulder at someone I love.  About teaching students how to get up from the floor on the refreshing breath of a spiral, with its change of scenery along the way, rather than the jerk and pull default.

I thought about my forward facing-marching-driving-data entering selves.

Today’s question:  Can you find a spiral?   Can you ride a spiral?  And how does that change your point of view?

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Oct24

skip

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Skipping

by Robert Morgan

A carburetor skips, and rocks
will skip along the surface of
a pond. A fugitive will skip
the country if he can, and crooks
will skip the payment of their debts.
And one can walk content or run
with joy across a summer field.
But why omitting steps is such
a sign of pleasure’s hard to say,
as if the gap and shift, the quick
eliding interruption of
a stride, reflects the shiver jolt,
releasing dance; accentuates,
as heart is said to skip a beat,
the lift, arrhythmic, breathless gasp
and rush and reach of crossing first
one threshold then another in
the vivid hop from foot to foot,
the hurrying toward and with delight.

“Skipping” by Robert Morgan, from Terroir. © Penguin, 2011. Reprinted with permission. (buy now)

This is from The Writer’s Almanac.  Sent to me by my friend Suzanne.

Can you find a skip today?

Oct15

being animal 2

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Photo:  Ashes and Snow

Being animal is the hardest thing to sustain in the digital maelstrom.  Leaving the body is so easy . . .

Here’s a simple way to re-enter the animal body.  Even with your fingers on the keyboard, close your eyes and feel your paws resting on the landscape of the keys.  Breathe in and notice what you are smelling.  What do you hear?  Sounds far, sounds near.  Notice the exact position of your feet, your spine, your tongue.

I think that being animal demands that we cultivate prey sense – the way a horse attunes to every signal – it is protection.  All the senses ask:  where is the danger?  For the predator, it is more of a map.  All the senses ask: where is the food?  When I drop in this way, all of my senses ask:  where am I?

What do your senses ask?

Oct7

living in the material world

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I watched the second half of Martin Scorcese’s HBO documentary on George Harrison last night.  Inscrutable, whimsical, beautiful.  The dark horse, the spiritual man.

My take away is that he lived the improvisation life – he let himself be moved, changed, followed the call, dove deep, came up different.  The through line was looking for the deepest place that his music could take him.

I loved the image of him pulling Ravi Shankar along a path through the brush to the edge of the thrashing Pacific, and both of them gazing down into that wildness.

Have you found the deepest place that your _________(fill in the blank)__________ can take you?  Are you on the path?