The Lonely Dancer and Other Poems

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by Richard Le Gallienne
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Title: The Lonely Dancer and Other Poems
Author: Richard Le Gallienne
Release Date: December 14, 2003 [eBook #10457]
Language: English
Character set encoding: US-ASCII
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE
LONELY DANCER AND OTHER POEMS***
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THE LONELY DANCER AND OTHER POEMS
BY
RICHARD LE GALLIENNE
1913
WITH A FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT BY
IRMA LE GALLIENNE
TO
IRMA

ALL THE WAY
Not all my treasure hath the bandit Time
Locked in his glimmering
caverns of the Past:
Fair women dead and friendships of old rhyme,

And noble dreams that had to end at last:--
Ah! these indeed; and
from youth's sacristy
Full many a holy relic hath he torn,
Vessels of
mystic faith God filled for me,
Holding them up to Him in life's
young morn.
All these are mine no more--Time hath them all,
Time and his
adamantine gaoler Death:
Despoilure vast--yet seemeth it but small,

When unto thee I turn, thy bloom and breath
Filling with light and
incense the last shrine,
Innermost, inaccessible,--yea, thine.
CONTENTS
THE LONELY DANCER
I
FLOS AEVORUM
"ALL THE WORDS IN ALL THE
WORLD"
"I SAID--I CARE NOT"
"ALL THE WIDE
WORLD IS BUT THE THOUGHT OF YOU"
"LIGHTNINGS
MAY FLICKER ROUND MY HEAD"
"THE AFTERNOON IS
LONELY FOR YOUR FACE"
"SORE IN NEED WAS I OF A
FAITHFUL FRIEND"
"I THOUGHT, BEFORE MY SUNLIT
TWENTIETH YEAR"
II
TO A BIRD AT DAWN
ALMA VENUS
"AH! DID YOU
EVER HEAR THE SPRING"
APRIL
MAY IS BUILDING
HER HOUSE
SHADOW
JUNE
GREEN SILENCE

SUMMER SONGS
TO A WILD BIRD
"I CROSSED THE
ORCHARD WALKING HOME"
"I MEANT TO DO MY

WORK TO-DAY"
"HOW FAST THE YEAR IS GOING BY"

AUGUST MOONLIGHT
TO A ROSE
INVITATION

SUMMER GOING
AUTUMN TREASURE
WINTER
THE
MYSTIC FRIENDS
THE COUNTRY GODS
III
TO ONE ON A JOURNEY
HER PORTRAIT IMMORTAL

SPRING'S PROMISES
"APRIL IS IN THE WORLD AGAIN"

"SINGING GO I"
"WHO WAS IT SWEPT AGAINST MY
DOOR"
"FACE IN THE TOMB THAT LIES SO STILL"
"I
KNOW NOT IN WHAT PLACE"
RESURRECTION
"WHEN
THE LONG DAY HAS FADED"
"HER EYES ARE
BLUEBELLS NOW"
"THE DEAD AROSE"
"THE BLOOM
UPON THE GRAPE"
THE FRIEND
ADORATION
"AT
LAST I GOT A LETTER FROM THE DEAD"
IV
SONGS FOR FRAGOLETTA
V
A BALLAD OF WOMAN
AN EASTER HYMN
BALLAD OF
THE SEVEN O'CLOCK WHISTLE
MORALITY
VI
FOR THE BIRTHDAY OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
TO RALPH
WALDO EMERSON
RICHARD WATSON GILDER
IN A
COPY OF FITZGERALD'S "OMAR"
VII
A BALLAD OF TOO MUCH BEAUTY
SPRING IN THE
PARIS CATACOMBS
A FACE IN A BOOK
TIME,

BEAUTY'S FRIEND
YOUNG LOVE
LOVERS
FOR A
PICTURE BY ROSE CECIL O'NEIL
LOVE IN SPAIN
THE
EYES THAT COME FROM IRELAND
A BALLAD OF THE
KIND LITTLE CREATURES
BLUE FLOWER
THE HEART
UNSEEN
THE SHIMMER OF THE SOUND
A SONG OF
SINGERS
THE END
THE LONELY DANCER
I had no heart to join the dance,
I danced it all so long ago--
Ah!
light-winged music out of France,
Let other feet glide to and fro,

Weaving new patterns of romance
For bosoms of new-fallen snow.
But leave me thus where I may hear
The leafy rustle of the waltz,

The shell-like murmur in my ear,
The silken whisper fairy-false
Of
unseen rainbows circling near,
And the glad shuddering of the walls.
Another dance the dancers spin,
A shadow-dance of mystic pain,

And other partners enter in
And dance within my lonely brain--
The
swaying woodland shod in green,
The ghostly dancers of the rain;
The lonely dancers of the sea,
Foam-footed on the sandy bar,
The
wizard dance of wind and tree,
The eddying dance of stream and star;

Yea, all these dancers tread for me
A measure mournful and
bizarre:
An echo-dance where ear is eye,
And sound evokes the shapes of
things,
Where out of silence and a sigh
The sad world like a picture
springs,
As, when some secret bird sweeps by,
We see it in the
sound of wings.
Those human feet upon the floor,
That eager pulse of rhythmic
breath,--
How sadly to an unknown shore

Each silver footfall
hurryeth;
A dance of autumn leaves, no more,
On the fantastic wind
of death.

Fire clasped to elemental fire,
'Tis thus the solar atom whirls;
The
butterfly in aery gyre,
On autumn mornings, swarms and swirls,
In
dance of delicate desire,
No other than these boys and girls.
The same strange music everywhere,
The woven paces just the same,

Dancing from out the viewless air
Into the void from whence they
came;
Ah! but they make a gallant flare
Against the dark, each little
flame!
And what if all the meaning lies
Just in the music, not in those
Who
dance thus with transfigured eyes,
Holding in vain each other close;

Only the music never dies,
The dance goes on,--the dancer goes.
A woman dancing, or a world
Poised on one crystal foot afar,
In
shining gulfs of silence whirled,
Like notes of the strange music are;

Small shape against another curled,
Or dancing dust that makes a
star.
To him who plays the violin
All one it is who joins the reel,
Drops
from the dance, or enters in;
So that the never-ending wheel
Cease