Showing posts with label summer travels. Show all posts
Showing posts with label summer travels. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

a series of streams

the following is a series of stream-of-consciousness writings i have written over the course of the past few days (both before and after my departure for the yard)

Paul Taylor in the park. Extraordinary. Farewell, New York City.  I depart in forty-eight hours . Excitement abound. I am on the train to Bronxville. Going to see Josh for the last time. The sun set on the dancers. Esplanade was special tonight.

I made friends with old ladies. They wished me luck on my journey.

you will find me
in the sycamore trees
that's where i'll be
all alone, dreaming of you
combing the fair breeze.

watching the bees suckle honey from little flower to flower, the beauty of their calculations. i want to live out in the country, though part of me despises it. they morning fog creeps away revealing the sun-and-cloud speckled sky. i think about my future, the weary world's future, then the homesickness sets in a bit.

thoreau once came to the beaches of Staten Island. This is what he said of those sandy plains by the water's edge:
The sea-beach is the best thing I have seen. It sits very solitary and remote, and you only remember New York occasionally. The distances, too, along the shore and inland sight of it, are unaccountable great and startling. The sea seems very near from the hills, but it proves a long way over the plain, and yet you may be wet with the spray before you can believe that you are there. The far seems near and the near far.

-Thoreau to Emerson, Staten Island, June 8 1843 (as written on the boardwalk)

the tree on the lawn.
dusk is a fair  time on the vineyard.
crickets play their pretty little things
seeing at the sound of it
that time is never
i hear the guitar music, folks in the distance
and not a car around.
the pale haze surrounds the trees
that nestle us inside a cocoon
of water starlight
i want my home
to be
forever
in
the startle open.

deers on the highway sound
far away
from here

i have this image of me slow and moving with the love of my life. he's looking at me and i at him and we are like two children-- smiling and laughing but continuing this slow waltz, our weight sinking into each other equally, we hold on with our eyes-- he's my dancing partner.

meet me by the river for a swim.
 -m

Thursday, August 5, 2010

paul in the park
paul taylor performance free this evening!




I am super excited about tonight's free performances. In anticipation, I have watched an early filmed version of Esplanade on Youtube, probably 10 times already. Here is my favorite section from the dance, the very last section which is the most kinetic and also the most urgent. Much of my dance work owes a lot to this dance. Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHkciz_yYYI&feature=related

Things I will be thinking about during tonight's performance: How the performance of Esplanade has evolved over the generations of dancers who have danced it... how has the virtuosity of the technique expanded and what has been lost/gained. Also, I will be thinking of its splendid beauty.

And just to refresh, tonight's performances begin at 7.30pm with Paul Taylor 2, the apprentice company. They will perform 3 Epitaphs followed by Esplanade. The senior company will then perform Airs, Syzygy, and Company B. Performances take place at Damrosch Park as part of the Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival. For those of you who don't know where that is (I didn't until I looked it up,) it is located at 70 Lincoln Center Plaza & W 62nd St, New York, 10023. Telephone: (212) 875-5456

Take the 1 train to W 66th and walk down, the Bandshell is nestled between Amsterdam Ave and W 62nd. 


Paul Taylor 2 will continue to celebrate his 80th birthday dance season with another free performance, August 13th with Naganuma Dance Company at the East River Amphitheater. Performance starts at 7. The bill will include Airs and Company B.

***

I will see this performance tonight as a parting gift from nyc to me before I leave for Martha's Vineyard. My trip will include a long bus ride followed by a steamship ferry. I leave August 7th and will not be back again until September 30th. During my stay, I will update my blog frequently-- covering the dance classes, performances, lectures, and beauty of the island. I hope to take pictures and films, draw, and send postcards to my dearest friends and family.

Here's to safe travels, beautiful summer vacations, and free dance in the park :)

peace and love dear readers,
melissa