HOW TO HOLD YOU BACK TOGETHER

“How to Hold You Back Together” is an improvised poem built on kind, curious, and failed gestures of re-joining. Through spontaneous movements and words, Anita attempts to understand what it means to fall apart and where to go from there.

Presented at the International Institute for Critical Studies in Improvisation "Improv Fest", August 2021.

How to hold you back together - 

what does that really even mean? 

a re-joining, 

an undoing,  

and redoing 

You’ve come to me in pieces, 

and I ask - how can I help you? 

There’s an invitation for change, 

but what do you want? 

I’m looking for ways to hold you - 

hold you into a new becoming. 

Hold you into what?  

Into anything? 

Together? 

Apart? 

Do you need me, 

do you need change, 

do you need to be yourself in a different way? 

Am I holding you back together, or am I holding you back? 

There’s in a beauty in undoing - 

un-knowing, 

not knowing, 

un-learning, 

unravelling, 

and is that enough - appreciating the “un”? 

I’m getting attached  

to re-attachment 

and still, things fall apart. 

How soft is too soft? 

Am I holding you? 

Am I knowing you? 

I know you. 

I think we’re the same.