“Dance Trance” Excerpt (Source: Geo Davis)

I’ve maintained for years that a hug is often the only sensible way to work some things out. Words can become so clunky, so specific, so loaded. But a hug speaks on a deeper and less antagonistic way, reaffirming the most important sort of connectedness.

This poem, a chant more than a song, is a reminder that sometimes — when even a hug isn’t able to bridge the void — dancing is the best if last resort. Maybe sometimes it should be the first? Or the third, I suppose, right after words fail and a hug falls slightly shortly. I find this especially true when anger and anxiety are thrown into the mix. Then dancing can be the best therapy, mingling anger and passion, confusion and whatever else is rupturing the bond between people.

Advance to

trance because

it’s remedy.

 

Let it go,

feel the flow,

fast, then slow.

Sometimes I can dance for hours with total abandon. A true trance. Processing. Exorcising. Recovering.

Dance can be such a total commitment (or no commitment at all!) and  a profoundly visceral and immersive act. It’s a way to wrestle the beast without damaging yourself, without damaging others. It’s a writing argument fought out in the most physical and cathartic of terms.

“The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.” ~ Alan W. Watts (Author of The Way of Zen)

“Dance Trance” is a reminder to plunge in. Wrestle. Embrace. Yield. And often this works in some mysterious way to help sort out the heart and soul and eventually even the words.

This poem was included in Midlife Crisis Postponed. Listen to a recording of the full poem below.