始め
a love letter to ballet:
i began dancing at university, first semester of 2025. a dance subject offered at the university of melbourne, southbank campus. i was introduced to contemporary and jazz for the first time, and, i was enamoured, finally stepping into my body and exploring ways of moving that i had always dreamed of, and i found myself… wondering… is this it?
through classes, i had closely observed, noted and studied the intricacies of other people’s bodies and how they moved, noticing their lines, various forms, what was emerging from them, what they had honed over years of dancing, and what they had began to explore for the first time.
some of the young women in my class possessed an exquisiteness… a sacredness, a weightlessness, an air of utter grace and poise that prompted me to studiously ask them about their experiences with dance.
“Oh, I did x years of ballet.”
i asked about a dozen or more dancers, and kept hearing “ballet.”
ballet used to be something i hadn’t given much thought to. black-and-white vignettes of a music box from my childhood passed through my mind. as a starry melody played, a porcelain-like ballerina performed pirouettes within a velvet-lined box. i knew that ballerinas were soft and strong. that ballet was an embodiment of grace, poise and precision. i reflected on how i embodied these qualities, in my life, without ballet. how i could have more of that sacredness in my life, i wondered.
with each time the word ballet was uttered by a classmate, a thin, light, golden thread began to materialise out of the ether, tugging me closer and closer to a possibility i had least expected to find.
so i booked an open ballet class, and thought nothing of it until i slipped into the studio that fateful morning.
as soon as the piano began playing, i watched as the fabric of reality itself dissolved, taking me along with it, into the music, beautifully, delicately, softly, perfectly.
on that day, my soul was enraptured by ballet. and since then, my life has been unfolding like a thousand-petaled lotus, blooming with beautiful impossibilities. ballet has quietly moulded itself into the spine of the life i am living into, and each time i stand alongside the barre, i am coming home to myself.
「ただいま」
I’m home
「おかえり」
welcome home
my love for ballet is full, and it is wordless. it can only be expressed by a continuous surrender to it’s beauty, it’s delicacy, it’s strength, it’s timelessness. in every moment, in every breath. as poetry in motion, and poetry in stillness.
welcome to letters en pointe: an eternal lovechild of ballet and writing.
with love,
r.