CFS Alumni Dance

exponentially larger


can it be that the light from one
can make the light from the other even brighter?
that a construct can be created
and create itself
with abundant solos, myriad small groupings, whole group unions,
that can all be interlaced with each other
so that each reacts to the other
and builds exponentially larger than just the sum of their addition?

a construct that uses the visual,
the vocal,
the rhythmic, the melodic,
the active, the passive,
the comic, the serious,
the given structure that encourages improvisation,
a controlled whimsy?

the prime choreographer must have had a vision
of how to both release and bind at the same time--
to wrap the audience around the performers
and pull us into the dancers and the dance,
a dozen conversations before the dance seemed to start
and the dancers pull away to the stage,
an hour of virtuosity, fun--

popping corn of action,

there is pulling together,
spinning apart,
acting, reacting,
always connection,

dancer and musician create a magical hour,
ephemeral as a mist dissolved by the sun,
so there for a time,
and then it’s gone,
yet somehow inside I feel changed by it all,
and the dancers return at the end to follow up the conversation,
and keep us connected to the whole,

I work with words
and they at least give me the illusion of enduring,
yet a magnificent dance such as I witnessed today
reminds me how tenuous the shadow of words
compared to the reality they seek to know.

by Henry Walker
January 2, ‘09