The Boat Lullabies: Classic Ballroom Dances

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December 05, 2007

Classic Ballroom Dances

It was a grey day here in Chicago and I spent the day here in the apartment waiting for snow. For some reason I was reminded of this poem:

Classic Ballroom Dances

Grandmothers who wring the necks
Of Chickens; old nuns
With names like Theresa, Marianne,
Who pull schoolboys by the ear;

The intricate steps of pickpockets
Working the crowd of the curious
At the scene of an accident; the slow shuffle
of the evangelist with a sandwich-board;

The hesitation of the early morning customer
Peeking through the window-grille
Of a pawnshop; the weave of a little kid
Who is walking to school with his eyes closed;

And the ancient lovers, cheek to cheek,
On the dancefloor of the Union Hall,
Where they also hold charity raffles
On rainy Monday nights of an eternal November

-Charles Simic

When I started Square America I envisioned it as being something like this poem. It hasn't really turned out that way- I wish I had photos from that Union Hall dance floor but I don't. What I do have are a series of about 100 photos taken at an Arthur Murray dance studio from 1958 to 1962. I posted some of them here before but now I've posted a larger series of 50 photos here. The photos were all from the estate of the woman pictured here:

The man in the picture was, as far as I can tell, the head instructor. For the most part the photos were taken by a professional photographer who must have photographed most of the events there (and the larger events held at ballrooms in the city) and sold the photographs to the dancers. I am a bit surprised by how many photos this woman bought of the other dancers- some were 8x10s and couldn't have been cheap- but I'm glad she did.

I think this woman is my favorite.