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Dancing With My Children
When my daughter was small enough to fit on my lap – able to hold up her head and sit up but not yet walk away from me – I would play music and move her legs and arms up and down to the beat. I wanted her to hear the rhythm, to feel it…
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“Ballet for the Older Body” by Andrea Webber
“Ballet for the Older Body” by Andrea Webber I am a retired staff physician from a busy city hospital in the Bronx and in two weeks’ time I shall be 79 years of age. Over a decade ago, I left the intensity and art of medicine for the intensity and art of the barre. My local…
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My Mid-Life Crisis Samba Story by Susan Kim-Stuart
There comes a time in every woman’s life when she realizes the kids are about to leave the nest, her AARP card is whispering seductively from the junk drawer, while arthritic knees begin to squeak as she climbs a single flight of stairs. I’m two weeks shy of 57. My youngest is a high school…
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Two Salsa Poems by Joshua M. Hall
Random Saturday at Salsa No more docs for half a year, nor loves till who knows when. But there’s always room to dance through abyss’ gift of emptiness. And if nothing else be creatable ex nihilo, let there be swift joy between last week of sorrow and next week of sorrow.…
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Poems “Walk Gently” and “Reading the Body” by Ann Moradian
Walk Gently… Walk gently with feet that listen tenderly. It is my body you mark with each step. Know yourself by the feel of the air as it breathes through the pores of your skin. It is my soul you breathe in your lungs in your blood in your heart. Regard the…
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Imagine You Are a Dancer
Do you know where you are? Can you feel your backside pressing into the surface on which you are now sitting? Can you feel your head sitting on the perch of your neck, head swiveling gently so your eyes can survey your surroundings? What do your eyes take in? Can you see colors? Are they…
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Senses in Ballet Class
Sight: I see myself in the mirror and my extended body in space. I see the other dancers moving around me in lines, planes and circles. Smell: I smell the dusty, powdery air of rosin and old buildings with sooty window frames. When changing for class, I smell hair spray, the hot smell of blood…
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What’s in the Rosin Box?
There was always a rosin box in one corner of the dance studios I took classes in as a child. Ballet dancers rely on white, powdery rosin on their shoes to keep from slipping and sliding on the floor. Getting the amount right amount is part of the art. Too much is too sticky and…