an evening of the arts

Arts Eve ’09


how marvelous that so many can find so many ways
to reveal the arts that are within them:

a chorus of 38 middle schoolers,
near 30% of the school,
led by a long term teacher
whose blood throbs the beat of the school,







and a teacher who has been passing through these last few years,
giving his all for the time he’s felt called here,
and there’s been magic in his touch
that will be hard to forget,

the young people learn how to wow themselves and us
with the power of the harmony,
as the disparate finds itself true,
and finds the other,
so that the sound of their joining thrills us
with the greatness of the sum,

and the audience applauds and strolls to another revelation,

recorders harken back half a millennium
as the wind of the Renaissance blows again
from the lungs and the spirit of musicians born
as the twentieth century was ending,









and the audience applauds and strolls to another revelation,

team after team of found percussionists
use tubes, rhythm, and physicality
to make music with plaza & table & high structure,
their enthusiasm, their joy--manifest,

















and the audience applauds and strolls from one drumming to another
and then to the next revelation,





where dancers purposefully move with grace upon the grass
adding sand, grain upon grain, upon the visible structure below,







echoing the invisible structures which hold each dancer to the other
and to the memories of their time here at school,

amplified words and music drive and counterpoint
the movements of individuals, pairs, triads,
every dance fitting into a whole
like the voices of the chorus early in the show,

and the audience applauds and strolls a short way

to where whistle-led drums capture us




and move us to move, to smile,
to close the circle of our movement around the middle school,
to crescendo, and then to move into the building


and to be dazzled by drawings, paintings, masks, puppets, treats,



this art more lasting than ephemeral performance
but requiring more effort from us to find it
and give it the time and attention
that then can call up the creative genius of the artist,


this night many find many ways
to use the arts to express themselves
and with those arts to touch the best of the other
with the best of themselves.

by Henry Walker
May 7, ‘09