You catch my eye from across the room. The music flows over the floor. Soft and slow. I meet you halfway and you offer a hand. I lean towards you slightly as I lay mine lightly in yours. Pain is making my hands tremble slightly and I’m hoping you don’t notice. Gently you bring me to you and for a moment we hesitate with closed embrace. The tension hovers between us as the song wraps us in its mood. You lean towards me ever so slightly, as I raised my left arm and did the same. That half step is crossed as we come together into close embrace.
I let go of a breath and settle into your hold, as you bring an arm around me. The tension slowly melts out of my body, wrapping an arm around your shoulders, just enough pressure to hold me off the ground. Resting my head where it falls on your body. You drag my right arm up and over your other shoulder, wrapping yours around my waist. We lean in and soften. Weariness clings to my bones, as emotions rise up, I’m exhausted. I’ve been holding too much, I suspect you too, but what else is new?
We dance, a non verbal conversation of whispers and mummers. What do you need? What do you want? What do you feel? We ask. The song demands vulnerability, and walls come down slowly as we lean in. The world disappears, and it’s just us weathering life together. Seeing each other. Scars and all. Humanity. We take turns comforting the other through rising emotions. Admiring the other. Cherishing the other. Celebrating the other. Honoring the vulnerability of allowing another to touch your body. The whole body alight with music, each of us adding something to the sound. We might not be human to the rest of the world, for one reason or another. Our lives might be filled with pain outside of this room, this dance, this moment. We might feel alone, a drift and disconnected.
For now though, we hold each other through the seemingly endless song until it fades. We linger. In no hurry to leave the beautiful moment we shared. Slowly we separate into you and I. Tears burn my eyes as I softly smile up at you. A cozy warmth settling onto me. I think of a phrase of mine that always comes to mind in these moments, of “resting my soul on yours”. You smile back, as people mill around us. The two of us, take steps away from the “us” until we are together just by fingertips. Once last glance, and you and I turn away to be swallowed by the crowd.
“are you ok with close embrace?”
They quietly ask me and I sigh in frustration. A neat solution to a problem introduced by the very people who created it. It’s not a bad question, consent, but I find myself increasingly frustrated with it. It feels like a fundamental misunderstanding, or at best using a leaf blower to dust fine china. It obstructs and cuts off access to much of expression available for dance, inherent parts of the art form. And for what?
An idea of safety.
Whose safety? From who? From what?
More importantly who decided that we needed it?
And why.
People have associated blues dancing (and therefore aspects of fusion) as inherently sexy. And sexiness, is dangerous. Yet, that is so assumed to be an aspect that some communities are created to take advantage of it, and some dancers focus almost entirely on the component of sexiness. To be celebrated often means to be seen as a sex object.
Others outright dismiss a whole art form that is directly connected, ie swing and Lindy hop, because of its perceived sexiness. That its seeming lack of propriety was a reason to dismiss it as valid and valuable. If a dance isn’t performed for outsiders than it must not be worthy, and therefore something to be ashamed of. Suppressed behind the veil of respectability.
So people try to suppress and highlight sexiness as something inherent despite needing to change the dance it’s self to be or to find these ideas. Either it means it isn’t valid and we toss the whole dance out to stay safe, or we try to control the sexiness with curated containers, exclusive lists, and aggressive verbal consent. We judge what we do not understand.
sensual not sexual
For a while there was a movement towards this idea that it wasn’t sexual. You guys, its sensual and that’s different. It’s safe. Denying yourself sensuality is being prudish. It’s saying you don’t deserve pleasure. As the various scenes contended with Blues’s close embrace being a real thing we had to redefine it as something it wasn’t to prove it was. Good and worthy. As the various scenes struggled with sexual predation it was associated with that dance. that dance of creeps and creepiness.
that dance of grinding and debauchery, of alcohol and promiscuity. While feeding into age old arguments about Black art forms in general and specifically blues as it wasn’t tied to the church. Blues which was tied to the old ways before Black people ascended into “proper” people. Yet ignoring that they too were doing Black art forms that once were also considered wild, dangerous and improper. Moreover that it might be the people who traveled between spaces of that dance and respectable dances that were the real issue.
If we remove the sexiness, if we remove the young adults, if we add space, if we “clean it up”, if we add consent checks then it will be safe to do. Don’t be afraid of this Black dance, you’ve misunderstood! It is actually within your comfort zone and if it’s not we will make it to be. It’s just physically pleasurable to be held and doesn’t have to be about sex and sexiness.
An attempt at trying to address the fear and discomfort with close embrace, and yet, something was lost. Something intrinsic was left behind in the seeking of comfort, and clarity. In the recalibration of making a safe space, friction was added and overtime the distance between bodies increased. In this shift, people slowly started to struggle with the “sensual vs sexual” difference. New people came in and saw close dancing and brought sexiness and felt chastised. What is sensual when people leave with feelings and desires? What’s the point if it doesn’t keep predators away? If it doesn’t change the reputation of the dance?
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racism internalized and otherwise
Black people have had our dances and music sexualized since we were brought to this country. And yet those art forms have been admired and lusted after just the same. No different than our bodies. One major split between being of the Black diaspora in the US vs others places is the mixture of lust and disgust. A yearning for Black bodies and an infantilization of Black minds. The desire and the separation. The one drop rule. We have been seen as other and that other is sexual. One only needs to look at the popularity of some adult content to see that this is still happening.
Via existing our men are seen as dangerous, masculine and ruinous. Via existing our women are seen as both maternal and curvaceously seductive. Our youths are aged much beyond their years in the eye of outsiders and judged against the idealized white youth. Our queers, worthy of admiration and stealing and yet untouchable. This is today.
That’s not even including our dancing our music. With values from another part of the world our culture has always disagreed with White American culture (and those of the European countries they came from) These dances have always been eyes are sexual by outsiders. Yet for us, that sexuality wasn’t always the case. Passion, isn’t sexuality. Letting one’s self go to something higher and bigger isn’t just done through stillness but through explosive movement. Through celebrating one’s body and the aspects we value on them. A different relationship to sex and sexuality informs the ways we come together and the nuances of what is and what isn’t sexual to begin with.
Is twerking sexual? It CAN be. But is it always? Moreover that our dances at times drew attention that was unsafe to receive. Be it from a lustful master or simply a sign of your lack of evolved humanity. Or even, a lack of Christianity which protected you from a great deal of mistreatment and it could ,at times, benefit you to stay close to it. Problems we STILL have today.
but I have my reasons!
Over the years I have heard many arguments for why someone doesn’t do close embrace. I have no issue with any one person’s reason, and yet I have to challenge the reasons of the population that feels this way. What bias and assumptions are YOU bringing to the table? When people push back on me about this I often bring up Balboa. Is Balboa, sexy? People chuckle to themselves, “no…”
“So, how is close embrace in blues any different?” People stop chuckling. Is your assumption that a torso to torso embrace in one dance is sexy and isn’t in another…. Racism?
Sometimes I get push back. But hips and ass! And I ask, what are qualities that many Black people both passively possess and is culturally celebrated as a part of the body, with and without focus on sexuality? Is our bodies existing, sexual? or is it is our use of them that falls outside of your values. That one can’t use hips and ass outside of sexual context? What about tango? I ask if it’s sexy and normally people get my point. But at times they push back, but it IS sexy! (another topic, honestly) But, is that the power and restraint or is it the twisting torsos against each other, the closeness. Or our romanticized image?
If you don’t like close dances, I understand. The closeness can be difficult for people with certain backgrounds. Be that, cultural, value wise, or histories of sexual assault. But then if you feel safe in other close dances, I have to question if it’s something you have investigated. Because just like those dances can range in interpersonal tone, so can blues. (And therefore fusion)
afraid of intimacy
Intimacy is what we are all so afraid of. Reality is that there are different types of intimacy. The closeness you might feel with family isn’t the same as a friend, and a friend as with a lover. If intimacy and vulnerability is something you struggle with, if inviting and rejecting it is difficult, if knowing what you want is hard… I want to gently encourage you trying close embrace.
Something I don’t hide is my background with abuse. I came to dance not in a good place. Touch was deeply associated with pain and fear. The intimacy of open position, being looked at, and being admired, was too much. Let alone close embrace. I feared trusting others. I regularly panicked. Navigating the nuances of intimacy and close embrace, is still at times hard. Yet, not only the journey but the ability to fall into close embrace has been one of the most profoundly impactful to my personal life. By allowing myself to grow, to be impacted, to question my beliefs and habits, I have been given such a gift.
A part of this dance, and in some ways most black arts, is about duality. Celebration and grief. Pain and overcoming. Vulnerability in a hostile world. Humanity in a world that tells you you aren’t. That our feelings and expressions matter. That our bodies are allowed to BE, allowed to experience a range of human existence and experiences. That we can be free if just for a moment.
That freedom is something one must fight for even if, and perhaps because, it might never be safe. But is it worth it? Is it worth it to be open if afraid? To allow another to potentially hurt you? To put your trust in another. To acknowledge your own messy human journey and it be enough. To see and be seen. Particularly if you have been hurt before.
Or do we say it’s too dangerous.
Do we acknowledge the danger in pretending away the reality in some dances and try to control for the danger in others? Or…. Do we demand that we learn to treat each other better, graciously accept a no, to assert a yes, to learn how to safely open ones self up to another? Do we teach the skills, or do we put up guardrails that many people ignore anyway.
Do we learn to lean into what we want, vulnerability and all? Because close embrace can be beautiful and intimate, and sexy or sensual, or familial, or challenging, tense or relaxed. It is all these things and none. What it is what you and your partner brings to it. It SHOULD be multiple things because the beauty of dance is this song with this partner in this moment in time can never be replicated. It should shift as songs and partners change, as you grow and feel. The question is not is close embrace sexy (and therefore dangerous or inappropriate) but is the idea of being close to someone/intimate/vulnerable is only either sexy or never sexy.
