DEDICATED TO LUCY BATES
(Being a reminiscence of certain private theatricals.)
Oh, cabaret dancer, I know a dancer,
Whose eyes have not looked on the feasts that are vain.
I know a dancer, I know a dancer,
Whose soul has no bond with the beasts of the plain:
Judith the dancer, Judith the dancer,
With foot like the snow, and with step like the rain.
Oh, thrice-painted dancer, vaudeville dancer,
Sad in your spangles, with soul all astrain,
I know a dancer, I know a dancer,
Whose laughter and weeping are spiritual gain,
A pure-hearted, high-hearted maiden evangel,
With strength the dark cynical earth to disdain.
Flowers of bright Broadway, you of the chorus,
Who sing in the hope of forgetting your pain:
I turn to a sister of Sainted Cecilia,
A white bird escaping the earth’s tangled skein:-
The music of God is her innermost brooding,
The whispering angels her footsteps sustain.
Oh, proud Russian dancer: praise for your dancing.
No clean human passion my rhyme would arraign.
You dance for Apollo with noble devotion,
A high cleansing revel to make the heart sane.
But Judith the dancer prays to a spirit
More white than Apollo and all of his train.
I know a dancer who finds the true Godhead,
Who bends o’er a brazier in Heaven’s clear plain.
I know a dancer, I know a dancer,
Who lifts us toward peace, from this earth that is vain:
Judith the dancer, Judith the dancer,
With foot like the snow, and with step like the rain.
(Vachel Lindsay)
More Poetry from Vachel Lindsay:
Vachel Lindsay Poems based on Topics: God, War & Peace, Heaven, Sadness, Flowers, Hope, Dancing, Pain, Snow, Music, Sisters- Bryan, Bryan, Bryan, Bryan (Vachel Lindsay Poems)
- An Indian Summer Day on the Prairie (Vachel Lindsay Poems)
- A Colloquial Reply: To Any Newsboy (Vachel Lindsay Poems)
- Written for a Musician (Vachel Lindsay Poems)
- The Knight in Disguise (Vachel Lindsay Poems)
- In Memory of a Child (Vachel Lindsay Poems)
Readers Who Like This Poem Also Like:
Based on Topics: God Poems, Sadness Poems, War & Peace Poems, Heaven Poems, Flowers Poems, Hope Poems, Pain Poems, Snow Poems, Praise Poems, Music Poems, Dancing PoemsBased on Keywords: prays, russian, escaping, sane, cecilia, evangel, sainted, arraign, high-hearted, innermost, lucy
- The Wild Knight (Gilbert Keith Chesterton Poems)
- Alma; or, The Progress of the Mind. In Three Cantos. - Canto II. (Matthew Prior Poems)
- Hermann And Dorothea - VI. Klio (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Poems)
- The Traveller; or, A Prospect of Society (Oliver Goldsmith Poems)
- A Story Of Plantagenet (Nora Pembroke Poems)