C.D. Warner, et al., comp.
The Library of the World’s Best Literature. An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Ernest McGaffey (b. 1861)
A Dancer
I
The dancer, the octoroon,—
On a space of polished wood
With glittering sand-grains strewn;
And a rapid rhythmic tune
From the strings of a mandolin
Leaped up through the air in viewless flight and passed in a strident din.
But her hair was black as night,
And a diamond’s bluish spark
From its masses darted bright,
While around her figure slight
Clung a web of lace she wore,
In carving lines of unhidden grace as she paused on the sanded floor.
From the frets of the mandolin,
While the shadowy arches rang
With insistent echoes thin;
And there, as the spiders spin
Dim threads in a ring complete,
A labyrinthine wheel she wove with the touch of her flying feet.
Then swung in a circle round,
Fast weaving a changing weft
To the changing music’s sound,
As light as a leaf unbound
From the grasp of its parent tree,
That falls and dips with the thistle-down afloat on a windy sea.
Swept on in jarring sound,—
Advanced and rose and fell,
By gathering echoes crowned;
And the lights whirled round and round
O’er the woman dancing there,
With her Circe grace and passionate face and a diamond in her hair.