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Home  »  The New Poetry  »  Dancing Adairs

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.

Dancing Adairs

By Conrad Aiken

BEHOLD me, in my chiffon, gauze and tinsel,

Flitting out of the shadow into the spotlight,

And into the shadow again, without a whisper!—

Firefly’s my name, I am evanescent.

Firefly’s your name. You are evanescent.

But I follow you as remorselessly as darkness,

And shut you in and enclose you, at last, and always,

Till you are lost, as a voice is lost in silence.

Till I am lost, as a voice is lost in silence.…

Are you the one who would close so cool about me?

My fire sheds into and through you and beyond you:

How can your fingers hold me? I am elusive.

How can my fingers hold you? You are elusive?

Yes, you are flame; but I surround and love you,

Always extend beyond you, cool, eternal,

To take you into my heart’s great void of silence.

You shut me into your heart’s great void of silence.…

O sweet and soothing end for a life of whirling!

Now I am still, whose life was mazed with motion.

Now I sink into you, for love of sleep.