busySo I've been enjoying the crowdfunded bellydance project by 
mikalay and it got me thinking about this style of dance. Then my_partner_doug pointed me to her YouTube channel, which I hadn't noticed, and I really admired that. Whereupon I wrote this...
The Bellydancer's Secret
If you would learn to dance,
learn to become --
hang your hips from the drum
and turn your bones to silk,
to liquid, to rhythm
become a serpent sliding over sand
become a goddess gliding through the night
become an ocean rolling under moon --
for this is the dance of the desert
and the desert is in the dance
for all time and beyond time,
music beating the world into being,
shapes pressed out by the dancer's careful steps.
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Thank you!
August 2 2011, 17:10:28 UTC 9 years ago
And that is actually how I bellydance. The drum drives the motion. If I have to think up moves on my own, or worse yet, memorize them -- those styles of dance I tend to do badly.