Field Notes
Happy National Poetry Month from Stance on Dance!
BY JUSTINE HIGHSMITH; ILLUSTRATION BY CAMILLE TAFT
touch. ground. open.
floor duets they witness
apart, foot by inch
humming body, still
roaring teeth in bone-white jaw
compression of a thousand, maybe
two thousand more
eons of skin on dirt
place hands here.
hurried feet, plummet stare
bleeds wide the chest cavity
break apart quiet distance
now the voice speaks clearly: {000000} find evidence for what is not seen.
~~
collide, the center speaks for a point
.
leap———————————> leapt
consider falling now.
collide > <
~~
spatial sections unite under:
- we, almost if a pin pierces
- gaps inside or outside
- breath of the nape reflecting
- deep wells
- fist down, mapped doorway & steps approach us in the dark feeling.
1. edges
2. roped
3. conflict
4. ______
one. In
wander a space to fall into
you carving cloud placards ellipses
drop ladder
or, words are raised
crystalized
ash ash ash ash ash ash ash ash ash ash
quickening sand,
floor chimes a century, feral guide the air
is tending alone
Justine Highsmith is a choreographer, sound artist, and poet living in Portland, OR. Her work explores emergent meaning through group integration, and what our bodies excavate in a space.
Camille Taft is a seventeen-year-old dancer living in Longmont, CO, who has trained throughout her life in primarily ballet and modern dance. With both her parents as visual artists, she has always appreciated the excitement that comes from a collaboration of mixed media, and was thus overjoyed to have the opportunity to work with Stance on Dance.