by Cheryl Waitkevich
On Monday, February 16, Presidents’ Day, 22 professional dancers from the First Amendment Troop performed a 90-second contemporary dance, titled The ResistDance.
Yesterday, high fog, a marine layer, so gray even the air itself
casts a pallor. This morning, though the sun shines, the weather report
forecasts snow flurries. Before sunrise I watched a video made by dancers
in front of what was once The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts,
dancers dressed in maroon, the color of blood after it has met air.
The choreography starts with an unassuming woman in a knit cap,
jacket, old jeans like I might have worn when dropping my kid off
at school when I thought I’d just hurry home for a second cup of coffee.
She stands as some of the dancers surround her, make the shape
of a SUV while two other dancers as masked gunman approach,
and without guns shoot her chest and head until she falls
limp against the bodies that could never protect her.
The dancers dissolve and they're dancers again, surround
a thin tall, bearded man, slight bulge in his waistband. (Is it a gun?)
Pandemonium, confusion, paper and people swirling.
He helps someone falling after being pretend beaten
for which he is also pretend beaten, then shot multiple times
his body pummeled and shuddering as bullets hit
until finally, he lies still as dancers transform into angels
dancing with a couple of souls, these new-made spirits standing
hand-in-hand to look at the Washington Monument,
their reflection in the vast pond
in front of them present
for even God to see.
Cheryl Waitkevich (she, hers) spent forty years working in
healthcare. Now retired, she is enrolled in the Rainier’s Writers
Workshop, the MFA program at Pacific Lutheran University. She has been
published in West Trestle Review, Galway Review, River Heron Review, Innisfree Poetry Journal,
as well as other journals and anthologies. She lives on Squaxin land,
known now as Olympia, Washington with her husband Robert Jorgensen and
their wildly delightful dog Ollie.
