[excerpt]
…
The wild dance maddens in the van, and those
Who lead it – fleet as shadows on the green,
Outspeed the chariot, and without repose
Mix with each other in tempestuous measure
To savage music, wilder as it grows,
They, tortured by their agonizing pleasure,
Convulsed and on the rapid whirlwinds spun
Of that fierce Spirit, whose unholy leisure
Was soothed by mischief since the world begun,
Throw back their heads and loose their streaming hair;
And in their dance round her who dims the sun,
Maidens and youths fling their wild arms in air
As their feet twinkle; they recede, and now
Bending within each other’s atmosphere,
Kindle invisibly – and as they glow,
Like moths by light attracted and repelled,
Oft to their bright destruction come and go,
Till like two clouds into one vale impelled,
That shake the mountains when their lightnings mingle
And die in rain – the fiery band which held
Their natures, snaps – while the shock still may tingle;
One falls and then another in the path
Senseless – nor is the desolation single,
Yet ere I can say where – the chariot hath
Passed over them – nor other trace I find
But as of foam after the ocean’s wrath
Is spent upon the desert shore; – behind,
Old men and women foully disarrayed,
Shake their gray hairs in the insulting wind,
And follow in the dance, with limbs decayed,
Seeking to reach the light which leaves them still
Farther behind and deeper in the shade.
But not the less with impotence of will
They wheel, though ghastly shadows interpose
Round them and round each other, and fulfil
Their work, and in the dust from whence they rose
Sink, and corruption veils them as they lie,
And past in these performs what in those.
Struck to the heart by this sad pageantry,
Half to myself I said’ – And what is this?
Whose shape is that within the car? And why -‘
I would have added’ – is all here amiss? -‘
But a voice answered – ‘Life!’ – I turned, and knew
(O Heaven, have mercy on such wretchedness!)…