Here is to the dancing at the edge of the crumbling world

Because this is who we are

Because our ancestors danced

Under the stars and under the canopy of the thousand-year old trees.

They danced because they didn’t know any other way to feel alive.

They danced because they just started realizing that they were alive

And it was all too much.

And now, what we have left is concrete and partly defaced murals

What we have is a lack of space to exercise our humanity

What we have are the cracks between the asphalt and more asphalt

Where we grow dandelions, fern and tiny seedlings of trees.

We must dance, no

We must choose to dance

Because there is still no other way to feel alive.

Children dance when they hear the music

Hunters dance for good luck in their hunt

Warriors dance to give themselves courage to face death

Women dance to please ancient goddesses whose names they’ve forgotten

Lovers dance for each other.

I like to imagine that we are flying in space, in an ever-expanding universe, still propelled by the force of the big bang that dragged us all from nothingness into being. And because we will never be able to possibly even remotely make sense of it all, because we will never be able to put it in words, we let our bodies do the speaking and the comprehending. We dance. We make love. We dance.