some things are more important then dancing

On Monday I went to a vigil for Michael Brown. I stood very still and held onto my candle. I learned the difference between “murder” and “homicide”

There was a moment when the anger I felt almost knocked me to the ground.

But then I heard the phrase “revolutionary love” and I felt the earth shift beneath my feet.

The undertow of the conversation was about forgetting. Who has the privilege to forget and who doesn’t? Last night I dreamt that I was at the campus where the vigil took place. I was on top of the buildings and I was running. I kept slipping and sliding down the slanted roof of the building and falling into a black hole. I would climb out and start running across the rooftops again. I would slip and fall into the same black hole, over and over again. And then I would climb out and start running again. You know that I love dancing. But on Monday night I just couldn’t do it.

Something more important was happening. Today I will dance.

It will be a slow dance with barely any movement at all.

Falling slow from upright and descending deep into the bottom of time.

Do you want to do it with me?

This slow fall.

Start standing or sitting.

Feel the pull up from your head and the dropping down from your tail.

Rooting so you can rise.

Notice your breath.

Notice how you feel.

and begin to fall slow.

just let yourself sink and and descend and see where you land.

And come back to upright, and do it again. And again. And again.

Go down under and submerge yourself in what is there. See what you see

and

Notice what you remember.

With Warmth, Joanna of Joanna and the Agitators.