My name is Paudriga Tuma and I love form and poetry, you know, sonnets or vylenels or pantumes,

and some of those might be considered to be traditional, but we're always working in farms today in so many of the ways that we write, you know, a text message, a recipe, an instruction manual, a sign telling you where to go, a newspaper or a dating profile all of those are forms of writing that we engage with

We have ideas about what it should be in order to make it comprehensible or good or useful and I love it when poetry uses these

as ways to engage as well as some of the older more traditional forms. Dear Dance exhibition by Ophelia Zepeda.

Question, can you tell us about what he is wearing? Well, the hooves represent the

deer's hooves. The red scarf represents the flowers from which he ate. The shawl is for the flowers from which he ate.

The shawl is for the skin.

The cocoons make the sound of the deer walking on leaves and grass.

Listen.

Question, what is that he is beating on?

It's a gourd drum. The drum represents the heartbeat of the deer. Listen. When the drum beats, it brings the deer to life. We believe the water the drum sits in is holy, it is life.

Go ahead, touch it, bless yourself with it.

It is holy.

You are safe now.

Question, how does the boy become a dancer?

He just knows.

His mother said he had dreams when he was just a little boy. You know how that happens. He just had it in him.

Then he started working with older men who taught him how to dance.

He has made many sacrifices for his dancing even for just a young boy.

The people concur. Yes, you can see it in his face.

Question, what do they do with the money we throw them?

Oh, they just split it among the singers and dancer.

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