A Fall
A Fall
driving the New York Thruway
later than I mean to
I feel the sky quite near
“twinkle, twinkle, little star…”
you fall
before my eyes
a long, two-second descent
burning out
in slow motion
“how I wonder….”
you’re splendid
in your final journey
then lost to blackness
without violence or alarm
they used to say
the stars were held in place
by hidden pins, behind the ceiling of the sky
like sets of dress shirt studs
or a vast array of jeweled rings
piercing the ears of heaven
did someone pull your pin?
in any case
you’ve gone to where all fallen stars
sleep away the ages,
while I wonder if I ever fall so slowly–
with so much ease
and so much grace
Palm Sunday
On Palm Sunday, my church lasts longer than usual and includes a wide range of emotions. It begins with large portions of the congregation’s going outside the building with their palms. The choir joins them and, after a blessing by the priest, this assemblage enters the narthex, replicating Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. We sing–loudly–“All glory, laud, and honor/ to Thee redeemer king” as the procession winds its way around the perimeter of the church and parishioners find their seats. So that’s the happy part. The rest of the 90 minutes is spent pondering the sad journey Jesus undertook during the last week of his life. What we sing is written in minor keys and what we say is painfully sad. A cantor speaks to how Jesus is reviled: dogs bark at him, people rend his garments and spit on him, he is offered vinegar that turns his stomach. The refrain that we all sing is “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”
Instead of a short Gospel reading followed by a homily, we hear the long story of that last week and I just weep at how alone this young man was and how betrayed he felt over and over. When he retreats into the Garden of Gathsemane, he asks the apostles he’s brought with him to keep watch in case the police try to take him. Twice he returns to the gate only to find these men sound asleep, so he asks them why they couldn’t stay awake just a little while to help him. Then he tells them he fears betrayal within their midst and Peter boasts that it would never be he, even though Jesus has warned him that he will betray him three times before the cock who proclaims a new day crows. Of course we then hear Peter sputter eagerly to three different citizens who say they’ve seen him with Jesus “Oh, no, it’s not I; I never met the man, I never was there.” When the reader tells us the rooster is crowing, I feel like I may not be able to stay in my seat; this story is just too painful. Finally, we hear about Pilate, who cannot act on what he knows is true–there is no evidence at all that Jesus is guilty of anything. This part of the gospel reminds me pointedly of all the current politicians–of all stripes, sadly–who mimic this stance, saying they know one truth but then being unwilling to act on that knowledge.
Every year at this service, I feel the same thing: We as a culture just keep doing what was done way back then in Jerusalem: we create heroes/saviors who shine for a short while before we turn against them and disavow all knowledge of them. In Jesus’ case, his community goes from throwing down carpets to line his path and waving triumphant palms before his donkey’s hooves to hammering nails into his hands and feet and leave him to die a slow and torturous death on a cross. Amazingly enough, they do this in the tiny span of only six days. So when we end this service by singing “What wondrous love is this, oh my soul, oh my soul,” I wonder indeed.
Alvin Ailey Magic
I’ve been watching the amazing dancers who work with the Alvin Ailey Dance Company since their first time to perform in Minneapolis, decades ago when they toured cities in the US. That night, I watched spell-bound as Judith Jamieson, a lead member of the corps, sashayed across our stage, left to right, jubilant and feisty under what has become a signature white parasol in one of the iconic moments in “Revelations.” The company has become one of this country’s premier artistic organizations, showing any who see them that black lives not only matter but can offer us all beauty and energy and focused passion. These days, I travel to Chicago every early March to see two nights of their offerings, a pilgrimage from which I have just returned. I want to say something about what I saw this time.
First of all, the Chicago audience adores these dancers and is made up of about 70% black people and 30% white people. This means the company (composed of young black women and men except for one Hispanic man, one Asian woman and two white men) gets great waves of appreciation and support from us in the seats, something that only fuels the hypnotic energy displayed on stage. I saw two new works, two older pieces rethought by current choreographers, a solo number (“In/Side”) that was unbelievably difficult and perfectly executed by Solomon Dumas, a relatively new member of the company. I saw a duo, danced with great verve and delight, to music provided by Ella Fitzgerald in one of her impeccable scat numbers in which she seems not to have bothered to breathe. And, of course, I saw “Revelations,” that crucial early piece so important to Alvin himself and so poorly received initially by New York City critics because of their unexamined racial stereotypes about who could dance and to what they could do that.
What I want to speak to now are those two performances of the story of sin and redemption, set in a Gospel modality. This is the fourth generation of dancers to render the scenes, so there is the chance of its having become a ritual without the original conviction felt by Jamieson and her fellow dancers. But nothing could be further from the truth. These young people are not just doing the “Ailey thing” to please the audience. I felt and saw their total commitment to being the very best ensemble from the moment the curtain rises to show them compacted into a sentient whole as they speak about being ‘buked’ but not broken. Though about twelve dancers thrust splayed fingers into the air or arch their individual arms to look like large birds intent upon flying away from danger, what I feel is a single organism, a community speaking and moving as one against injustice and sorrow. These days, the audience breaks into applause as soon as we see them, offering some kind of second-hand support for the journey about to be presented.
As the segments unfold–the single male sinner who wants to be “ready to put on that long white robe” of forgiveness and redemption; the three men still racing with that special energy we aren’t quite ready to give up sinning; the marvelous group of church women with their tiny stools and large fans, who congregate to share gossip and witness to Jesus’ goodness; the group in white gossamer waving tall banners and great cloth strips that become the water through which the lead dancers must “wade” to cross over into paradise; and the final assembly who sing over and over “Rocka My Soul in the Bosom of Abraham” as they and we magically know that goodness really can exist, even when the odds seem to project otherwise.
And then they all stop moving and most of us, black and white together, stand and shout and understand something for a few moments. Grateful, the dancers invite us to clap on the off-beat so they can keep going for a little longer. And lots of us do just that, caught up in a magic moment outside of time and the 24-hour news cycles that fragment and dishearten us. I keep expecting some of the audience to step out into the aisles and imitate the steps of our performers, or for some of them to leap down from the stage and move among us. That doesn’t happen, but the possibility hangs in the air. I only hope Alvin Ailey’s spirit somehow knows that this story in movement that he envisioned and formulated so long ago can still enliven both dancers and watchers, that those initial white critics were just plain wrong about who can dance and to what music.
Music for Two Queens
The Public Broadcasting System (PBS) and Netflix are producing multi-season programs about two of England’s three queens–Victoria (PBS) and Elizabeth II (Netflix). Perhaps an early clue to what each series is “about” comes in the titles: the episodes about Victoria are called “Victoria,” while the 6-year commitment from Netflix is called “The Crown.” One centers around a first name while the other focuses on the symbol of office. As someone fascinated both by how women act when given major political power and by the history of the English monarchy, I am an avid watcher of both series. The writing seems crisp and often moving while the productions themselves evidence careful research into the periods being filmed.
So much do I admire the acting in both cases, that I’ve watched the first two seasons of “The Crown” twice and have taped each episode of the two seasons of “Victoria” so that I have been able to re-view them. Anyone who is watching knows that “The Crown” stresses how Elizabeth chose to deny or contort some of her own personal feelings because, as the queen, she had to behave in accordance with custom and Parliamentary law. Contrarily, “Victoria” is showing us Victoria’s refusal to deny her humanity as wife and mother even as she moves more deeply into her position as monarch. One example in each case will illustrate this powerful difference in emphasis. The night before a very young Elizabeth is to be anointed as Queen, her husband whom she clearly loves passionately asks her not to ask him to kneel during the coronation. He says he will willingly speak obedience to her as his sovereign but that, as her husband, he recoils at kneeling. The actor playing Elizabeth shows us through facial language just how much she wants to make the exception and just how clearly she realizes what it may mean to their intimacy if she refuses. But she finally tells a pained Phillip that he must kneel. In contrast, when Albert speaks to an equally very young Victoria about feeling useless, she figures out how to change that by asking him to sit beside her at her writing desk and handle many of the documents facing her that have to do with subjects about which Albert knows more than she.
Because the plot lines are so familiar to me, I have grown sharply aware of how each director is using the theme music to reinforce this central distinction in the stories of these two long-reigning women. The signature music is arresting at the beginning of each episode. For “The Crown,” we watch mesmerized as the sound begins almost inaudibly while shimmering metal shapes move slowly but inexorably to form the crown spelled out on the screen. The volume increases as the shape emerges and what has begun as declarative major chords subtly changes to a minor key that sounds a loneliness painful to listen to. As each episode of “Victoria” is introduced, the “Coronation Alleluia” also begins very quietly as we see a late teen-aged girl whom we take to be the future queen. Her image changes until her hair has been trained into place and a small tiara rests on her head. This visual alternation takes place as the voices declaring the alleluias rise to musical heights that give me aesthetic goose bumps.
What’s happening as the episodes continue is this: Periodically Elizabeth II “hears” her theme music as she faces difficult decisions such as whether to let her much-loved sister Margaret marry the love of her life–something forbidden by stale English custom that forbids royalty to marry divorcees. What I notice as I witness these overlays of the theme music action in is that being reminded of her “place” as queen causes Elizabeth to turn away from her own values and feelings, thus ceding to the crown that hovers over the entire production. Watching Victoria in similar moments reveals quite a different relationship between monarch and music. On several occasions Victoria is shown alone as she ponders what to do about a given political matter, e.g., learning of the potato famine in Ireland or watching a little African girl experience homesickness amid the kindness extended to her by the white English lady. As we hear the theme music surrounding her in her quandary, it surely is not accidental that Victoria’s connecting to her “place” as queen prompts her to act directly and powerfully to defy customary laws, expectations and behaviors. For her the crown carries with it an obligation to a common good rather than a duty to continue along a time-honored but time-worn tradition that hurts both the queen and those around her.
So, as I wait impatiently for season three of these ambitious and moving programs, I think about the subtle role the theme music has played and, I trust, will continue to play as these two remarkable women mature as human beings and rulers.