NOW JEWELLED, ALIGHT, YOU LEAD THE MIDNIGHT
DANCES
by: Arthur Davison Ficke
(1883-1945)
- OW jewelled,
alight, you lead the midnight dances
A thousand eyes, a hundred hearts are yours.
In the great hall, the splendor of your glances
With beauty's secret promise lights and lures.
They flock to you; you smile; they press around you
And crave your favors each with satyr smile.
Does your look lie, or do they truly sound you
With flatteries that your warming heart beguile?
See--the low, lustful, thinly-maskèd faces!
They crowd about you, drinking in your bloom.
In fancy, each a taxi calls, and races
With you to his own Sybaritic room. . . .
I sit alone beneath my desk-lamp's glare,
Cursing the fate that made you mine, and fair.
"Now jewelled, alight, you
lead the midnight dances" is reprinted from Sonnets of
a Portrait-Painter. Arthur Davison Ficke. New York: Mitchell
Kennerley, 1914. |
MORE POEMS BY ARTHUR DAVISON FICKE |
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