wackydeli097:

At the age of 72, Helen Keller learned what it means to jump.

She became friends with choreographer Martha Graham and began visiting her at her dance studio. Keller was fascinated by the dancers’ movements, feeling the vibrations of their footsteps as they moved across the floor. At one point, she asked Graham, “What is jumping?”

So Graham brought her up to the barre and placed her hands on the waist of one of the dancers, Merce Cunningham, and he jumped.

A joyful smile spread across Keller’s face; she started moving her fingers quickly to sign, “How wonderful! How like thought! How like the mind it is!”

You can see that joy on her face here as she joins in a dance with Graham’s company. Keller, who conveyed her thoughts through bodily motions and touch, creates art by joining in a community of movement, a communal expression of those soaring, effervescent thoughts.

You can watch an excerpt from a short film of her visit here, which ends with this very dance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZqJL5uSZznU