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Life is About the Dance is a book of poems, inspirations and short essays reflecting on how we show up to life and how God shows up with us, illustrating the twirls, dips and spins of our lives through the lens of dance. The vision for this body of work was born out of the necessity for us to bend, jump and arabesque over life’s trials, while expressing the human condition with emotion, verve and intensity.
Lisa Brown Ross has a love for the arts, a love she clearly illustrates in her inaugural book Life is About the Dance. Using her poetic voice accompanied by carefully selected photographs of dancers, BrownRoss weaves a veritable homily on devotion and faith as demonstrated by one’s creative gifts. Her lyricism is both moving and powerful, giving the reader an emotional connection to her deep respect forGod’s omnipotence and how it guides her steps in her dance of life.
Life is About the Dance pivots between soulful laments and joyous recitations, in poems and essays that explore the power of the human spirit when it stays in sync with the Almighty. Brown Ross touches on a myriad of topics, ranging from the pain of domestic abuse in a poem Don’t Tell Me, to expressing the simple desire to feel joy through living in the moment in her poem I Want Happy. She very effectively uses the vocabulary of dance to move the reader through this meditation, and periodically catches you off-guard by framing a piece in words that suggest one thing is being discussed, only for you to realize that in fact it’s still centering the conversation on the wonder of the Creator’s love.
Whether you are a person of faith or not, Life is About the Dance will speak to you about the power of words and their creative employment by a gifted poet/writer to elevate your spirit. As Lisa Brown Ross so aptly says in her title poem Life is About the Dance, “…It’s about making a groove when there’s no sound, it’s getting up and getting down when no one is around, and standing on your feet without applause. Its crafting moves out of nothing and moving forward even when you’re the only one dancing.” If that doesn’t say everything that needs to be said about living a life steeped in faith, I don’t know what does! Life is About the Dance will keep you reading from cover to cover because each page brings a new inspiring and uplifting message.