RENO, Nev.—Feb. 8 was the second time award-winning poet and creative writer Rita Geil saw a Shen Yun performance when she came with a friend. She called a “happy accident.”

“I was invited to come with a friend who didn’t know I‘d seen it and was saying, ’Would you be interested in something like this?‘ And I said, ’Oh, this is not to be missed.' It is so inventive, and so gorgeous. And so well done,” said Ms. Geil at the the Pioneer Center for the Performing Arts.

Ms. Geil said everyday people are “busy with projects, and [Shen Yun] lifts you out of that to a higher place where you can understand the connections between all things.”

“I don’t think God is separate from us, that He just made us sit down here. But I really appreciate the uplifting, bringing your mind and your spirit to a higher place where it really belongs. I think it’s wonderful that we had a chance to do it.”

Ms. Geil commented on other dimensions. “Other dimensions are right here, [but] we are not aware of it. And a performance like this makes us aware of it. And of our connection to it’s right here in front of us.”

“A performance like this gives us a place where we can take a moment to realize what is really going on, and the connection between the divine and humanity. It’s all right here.”

“I just saw him sitting alone, and I had seen his picture in the program. Well, I walked up to him. I was moved. As I walked away, I said, ‘Thank you.’ He was very pleased. He didn’t say anything. I just said ’thank you' for what he has done.”