When fellow writer Chitra Divakaruni sent me an email saying their family dog had died & her son had made a dance video to honor Juno, and would I please watch & then share – I was expecting to get a little teary-eyed from viewing the tribute: I was not expecting to see love & grief transformed to such a pure-deep-true level of art that my heart would be opened up utterly.
The way Abhay Divakaruni moves limbs, his articulations of hand & foot, spine, neck & head is whole-body elegy. This choreography – that he has created & inhabited so fully, with such celebration & tender fury – is dance poetry.
Dear Abhay, I must thank you. Your art has reached through our not-knowing-each-other and made me feel less alone, more understood, because we have all – in one way or another – been a boy who lost his beloved dog, who still (please) just wants our beloved to come back to us, to (please) (I miss you) come home.
If art is about connection, there can be no argument that your dance qualifies. Juno was a lucky dog to have called your family her home. Blessings & peace to you & yours, Abhay,
Denise Lanier
Abhay speaks eloquently about his relationship to dance in this TEDtalk:
This is the artistic expression version of what Phil Keoghan calls No Opportunity Wasted! I believe it’s just as important to enact leaps of faith, great acts of daring, extraordinary reaches toward vulnerability & connection & grace with our art. Even – especially? – from places of darkness, longing, loss & mourning.
WordPlay 