per730-danza

7:30 PM

Remembering Fire
Danza Teokalli Dancers

"The fire is our god. Our God. My god. How have we forgotten the power of fire. What are we praying for here. What aren't we praying for?"

words by Martha Glaser
photo by Carla King

Netcast reporter Martha Glaser catches one of the traditional Aztec dances: the dance with fire.

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Feather plumes tall as a man on Aztec Dancers, five in all. Four men and a woman dance in pure geometric formations across the red concrete floor. The lone drummer on the stage pounds out the sound of a steady beat, sounds of a thousand years on the wooden stage, above the red concrete floor. The audience stands on the edges of the dancers' square. Scents of godknowswhat sweet herbs, incense called Copal, burning from the altarpot on the stage. Billowing smoke, smelling sweeter than sage, sweeter than burning wood, sweeter than singeing hair, burning skin.

Dancers dance in a solid square, four men and a woman, headdresses with spiking brown tailfeathers, tall as a man. Twirling in a circle, within the square. No smiles. Somber faces. "THESE ARE RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS WE ARE MAKING FOR YOU TONIGHT," says the man named Alvaro.

From Mexico City. "OUR LANGUAGE IS NAHUATL," and these are the salient facts. The rest is what we see.

The conch shell sounds like a shofar, I feel the ancestral past, the drumbeats in my chest. The carved wooden drum beats on, the smoke blows from the pot on the stage. The dances of a thousand years. As if there are no videos taping, as if there is no crowd bustling past. Bells in hands, bells on legs. The conch shell blows again. The sounds across the globe. One voice, a call. What is that sound. Video projection on the wall behind. Pacific pipe calls, as if people with press passes aren't scrambling to run past them behind.

A high-pitched whistle calls. Purple beads glisten across a man's chest, his long hair streaming, the glittering beads catching the light. Dancing on this red concrete floor as if we were somewhere else, as if we were out of doors, under the stars, under the sky, the one lone sky.

Fire is lit. We will all go ablaze. The conch blows an incantation. The audience joins in, some turn with the dancers, face the four directions, dancers moving with the pulse. The fire is now our focal point. The fire is our god. Our God. My god. How have we forgotten the power of fire. What are we praying for here. What aren't we praying for?

The dancer places his foot into the metal firepot. The smell of incense is fine, sweet and fine. The dancer now lies lovingly by the flame, in the metal pot on the floor, pulls close like a lover as he makes love to the fire. We look on, dazzled. How have we forgotten to love fire?

His hand enters the pot like a tongue, dipping down inside. He makes love with the fire, the flame on the firepot. While we, prurient voyeurs greedy for sensation, we just look on. We applaud. Because he is still here, has survived fire without burning skin?

Or maybe we applaud now because we have remembered how to love fire.