Feel what I feel.
Stand with your legs together, toes pointing forward. Open your hips so the backs of your knees are touching. Slide the heel of one foot in front of the other until it meets the toes. This is fifth position.
Under certain conditions (flexibility, training) your two feet will be firmly locked together: heel to toe and toe to heel. Your knees will be straight, your pelvis will sit squarely above your knees. It’s not natural but it is elegant. Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man but pulled together and not human spreading all over the place.
Contained.
Fifth is a position to begin things from. Fifth is a frequent point of return. It’s also itself. Movement. Dance, even if it is still.
See what I see.
James is teaching class. He wears a soft T-shirt and a pair of loose sweatpants. The soles of his dance sneakers are split like ballet slippers so he can demonstrate a pointed toe more easily. He’s a little vain about his feet, their high arches.
“. . . And contain,” James says, as the dancers close their legs to fifth position. “. . . And contain.”
The class—at an Upper West Side New York City studio—is by invitation or introduction only and filled with professionals. I picture the dancers, spaced out along the barres lining three sides of the room. I see the additional freestanding barres in the center, a spot where I might have stood. I’m not there. This is part of a story that was told to me.
James is prowling the studio in his soft clothes, his soft shoes. Not prowling. Gliding. He doesn’t appear to scrutinize the dancers, but they’re aware of his gaze, mild but penetrating…
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