the/my body?

the dancer

unlearning possession

unlearning unobserved obedience

unlearning undeserved obedience

unlearning giving everything

even when i don’t want to.

learning power

learning control

learning my voice

learning what’s mine

learning my body

learning to respect

my body

my choice

myself.

taking my body

taking what’s mine

taking my dancing.

not taking it away

not removing it from existence

not removing it from collaboration

but

recognising my power in situation

recognising my voice

recognising the control i have of

my body

my identity

what i give

what i want to give.

recognising the responsibility of every party in the container

recognising the shared responsibility to hold a safe space

recognising the shared responsibility for mutual respect

recognising the blur in creating

acknowledging

what i give away

what i give to share only in this container

what i don’t give, to hold safe.

deciphering

what is given to me to keep

what is given to me within this container only

what is perhaps withheld.

recognising my place in the authorship and ownership

considering

the relationship we have to possession

the grip we have to ownership.

the blur that coils and suffocates every body

avoiding taking a wrong step

taking/using what wasn’t given

was never mine

but was it theirs?

allowing space

to give and take

the space between

each other

that belongs to the container

space for the work to flourish

every party nurturing the work

for the work.

the work something else entirely

speaking for itself

having authorship of it’s own

the vehicle we surrender to

not succumbing to each other’s power

but the work’s

doing it for the work

for the art

for something beyond ourselves.