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Dance of Death
Proud of her heights as if she were alive,
she manages her props - her huge bouquet,
her scarf, her gloves - with all the unconcern -
? is it the disdain? - of a practical flirt.
When ever saw a wasp with a waist like that !
Of so many yards of gown so readily
gathered up to show a wizened foot
stammed into its crimson satin shoe?
The thrill that runs along her clavicle
as if a stream caressed the stones in its bed
? screens from idle scrutiny
the deadly charms she will keep in the dark.
Those shadows are the making of her eyes,
and the braid of buds around her nodding brow
is not so neatly plaited as her spine -
O lure of Nothingness so well tricked out !
Drunk in flesh, young lovers libel you
a caricature - they cannot understand
the beauty of your true embodiment:
Skeleton, you suit me down to the ground,
as grinning from ear to absent ear you some
to spoil the Feast, or cannot keep away
because some hunger in the marrow of your bones
compels you to our human carnival . . .
Will music and the flaring lights bequile
a mocking nightmare you cannot escape?
Is it the torrent of orgies you require
to douse the hellfire kindled in your heart?
Inexhaustible pit of folly and sin!
Eternal alembic of the ancient pain!
Threading the twisted trellis of your ribs
the insatiable worm, I see, is still at work!
To tell the truth, I fear your coquetry
will fail to find the victims it deservs:
which of these mortal hearts can take your jokes?
The charms of Dread are not for everyone.
What visions cloud the chasm of your eyes?
Even the bravest partner joins the dance
with a twinge of terror as he contemplates
the eternal smile of thirty-two white teeth!
Yet who has not embraced a skeleton,
not eaten what the grave claims for its own?
What does the costume matter, or the scent?
‘Disgusted’? All you show is your conceit!
Noseless camp-follower, irresistible drab,
disabuse these dancers of their airs:
‘For all your skill with powder and wih musk
each of you stinks to heaven-or hell-of death!
A withered Antinous here, his Emperor there,
equally worm-eaten, hoary belles and beaux -
the universal throb of the Dance of Death
drags you down to Whereabouts Unknown!
From Senegal to the cold quays of the Seine
the mortal swarm jigs on ecstatic blind
to the Angel’s trumpet somewhere overhead,
gaping like a blackened blunderbuss . . .
Death in every latitude dotes on you
and your contortions, ludicrous Mankind.
and often, like you, daubing herself with myrrh,
mixes her scorn with your delirium!
Charles Beaudelaire