I went to dance today and I spent some time thinking of my body as a city.

My arms were the rivers and my legs were the towers and my belly and thighs were the houses and parks and walking paths.

And I realized that nothing happens in this city that the rest doesn’t feel it, isn’t moved.

I started to sway the houses and I shook the towers and the rivers overflowed their banks.

I knew that the people of the city wanted stillness.

But I also knew that the people of the city needed movement.

And I, as the city needed movement and needed change for me to live.

I thought about my back, which was the dirt and infrastructure and the water table.

It was the earth’s crust under everything. And how it’s strong because it moves.

I waived my feet in the air. And then I put them on the floor. I walked them along the rivers.

And I wondered what part of the city feet would be.

And as I was walking, the towers were swaying and the houses were rolling and I thought about all the pain and disaster that had befallen the city over the years.

And I thought that this city might be a hard place to live. And also wonderful.

The thing about a city that rolls and shakes and is tense with trauma and stuck with old scars isn’t that it changes, or even that things move and leave and transition to something else.

The thing is that these changes should be making the backbone stronger.

Making the place live longer.