A stretch is a bow to the body

sensation as my priest

hello hello! greetings from a new spot, another shift. How have you been?

A couple months ago, I moved out of state to the mid-atlantic south and started an interdisciplinary dance MFA - yee haw. I am a student again which is bringing me familiar joys and new challenges . Last time I was in formal education, I didn’t have an instagram, I was studying engineering, I was discovering my sense of style and just beginning to think I was queer. I’m riding the same bike I had in undergrad (a rock solid, blue 80s roadie from mom), I started running again (and recently realized exercise and exorcism are basically the same word), and I’m feelin’ the excitement and age old insecurities of being new in town. I’m in discovery mode, absorbing all I can. This chapter is asking me to be with myself quite intimately, face the depths, and shake off some old and accumulated fears. 

I want to pull the curtain open, share with you some glimpses behind the scenes of an MhmmmFaa (MFA). I’m reading a lot of theory, moving everyday, seeing patterns everywhere, and feeling really grateful for warm and grounded professors. We’re blowing open any and all preconceived notions of dance and performance - it’s all a dance! Toddlers are genius improvisers! The grocery store choreographs your movement!

In movement research class this week, our professor offered the prompt: “bow until you mean it.” This was a part of an open score, for us to explore individually within a collective space. It was a gentle container, held with sensitivity to grief that befell our community this week. The bow - universal in it’s symbol for reverence, awe, and respect. It’s meaning personal and collectively determined. The prompt tapped into the universal symbol and gave space for discovery, extended time to feel our way into meaning. Below is a little stream of body consciousness – 

Slow to move, relishing the quiet, music-less moment. I gravitate towards the ground, finding a spot in the sun as I do. Let me absorb your glaring rays, lull me, wake me. I love looking at my hands in the sun, blonde hairs aglow, heirloom ring and small marking tattoos remind me, these are Your hands. Water body sloshes, lazily. Be a gentle witness, there are no grades, no marks to make or miss. Let this performance serve your fascia and bones. Put the judge to rest. The sun beckons, beams shift patiently. The body will do what they need to do. I round my spine, sensation slithers me, breath welcomes a pause. Chin tucked, eyes closed, warm exhale concentrates in the cavity of my soft torso. This is a stretch. What does it mean. The religiosity in me yearns for something, something, something I can’t quite articulate. A whisper of spirit, a thunderbolt of knowing, a warm hand on my shoulder. But what I feel is the stretch, especially right in that upper mid of my back, between shoulder blades, just as I inhale. Down by my pelvis, too, fascia pulling. This is a bow. Do I mean it, do I mean it? If you ask too much, maybe the answer is no. Who judges, who cares. Right now, my body is god, breathing, feeling, and saying yes. It’s simple, it’s really this simple. Again please, more. Worship me in movement, subtle and tense. In breath, yes. Do you feel it, right there, oh yes. Hummm hummmmhhmmm. This is familar. What if, a stretch is a bow to the body. A sacred remembering of belonging. A gesture of awe and undoing. A thank you, thank you, thank you. The pull gives space for whispers. The compression, a warm incubator. It lands meaning into cells that were once dust. How holy this temple of urges and knots. How divine this pulsing bag of life. 

With a humble bow and a juicy stretch– 

Be well,

emily