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Arthur Symons - The Dancer Of The Daughters Of Herodias
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Is it the petals falling from the rose? 
For in the silence I can hear a sound 
Nearer than mine own heart-beat, such a word 
As roses murmur, blown by a great wind. 
I see a pale and windy multitude 
Beaten about the air, as if the smoke 
Of incense kindled into visible life 
Shadowy and invisible presences; 
And, in the cloudy darkness, I can see 
The thin white feet of many women dancing, 
And in their hands I see it is the dance 
Of the daughters of Herodias; each of them 
Carries a beautiful platter in her hand, 
Smiling, because she holds against her heart 
The secret lips and the unresting brow 
Some John the Baptist`s head makes lamentable; 
Smiling as innocently as if she carried 
A wet red quartered melon on a dish. 
For they are Stupid, and they do not know 
That they are slaying the messenger of God. 
Here is Salome. She is a young tree 
Swaying in the wind; her arms are slender branches, 
And the heavy summer leafage of her hair 
Stirs as if rustling in a silent wind; 
Her narrow feet are rooted in the ground, 
But, when the dim wind passes over her, 
Rustlingly she awakens, as if life 
Thrilled in her body to its finger-tips. 
Her little breasts arise as if a thought 
Beckoned, her body quivers; and she leans 
Forward, as if she followed, her wide eyes 
Swim open, her lips seek; and now she leans 
Backward, and her half-parted lips are moist, 
And her eyelashes mingle. The gold coins 
Tinkle like little bells about her waist, 
Her golden anklets clash once, and are mute 
The eyes of the blue-lidded turquoises, 
The astonished rubies, waked from dreams of fire, 
The emeralds coloured like the under-sea, 
Pale chrysoprase and. flaming chrysolite, 
The topaz twofold, twofold sardonyx, 
Open, from sleeping long between her breasts; 
And those two carbuncles, which are the eyes 
Of the gold serpent nestling in her hair, 
Shoot starry fire; the bracelets of wrought gold 
Mingle with bracelets of carved ivory 
Upon her drooping wrists. Herodias smiles, 
But the grey face of Herod withers up, 
As if it drooped to ashes; the parched tongue 
Labours to moisten his still-thirsting lips; 
The rings upon his wrinkled fingers strike, 
Ring against ting, between his knees. And she, 
Salome, has forgotten everything, 
But that the wind of dancing in her blood 
Exults, crying a strange, awakening song; 
And Herod has forgotten everything, 
He has forgotten he is old and wise. 
He does not hear the doubled-handed sword 
Scrape on the pavement, as Herodias beckons 
The headsman, from behind him, to come forth. 
They dance, the daughters of Herodias, 
With their eternal, white, unfaltering feet, 
And always, when they dance, for their delight, 
Always a man`s head falls because of them. 
Yet they desire not death, they would not slay 
Body or soul, no, not to do them pleasure; 
They desire love, and the desire of men; 
And they are the eternal enemy. 
They know that they are weak and beautiful, 
And that their weakness makes them beautiful, 
For pity, and because man`s heart is weak. 
To pity woman is an evil thing; 
She will avenge upon you all your tears, 
She would not that a man should pity her. 
But to be loved by one of these beloved 
Is poison sweeter than the cup of sleep 
At midnight : death, or sorrow worse than death, 
Or that forgetfulness, drowning the soul, 
Shall heal you of it, but no other thing: 
For they are the eternal enemy. 
They do not understand that in the world 
There grows between the sunlight and the grass 
Anything save themselves desirable. 
It seems to them that the swift eyes of men 
Are made but to be mirrors, not to see 
Far-off, disastrous, unattainable things. 
"For are not we," they say, "the end of all? 
Why should you look beyond us? If you look 
Into the night, you will find nothing there: 
We also have gazed often at the stars. 
We, we alone among all beautiful things,
We only are teal: for the rest are dreams. 
Why will you follow after wandering dreams 
When we await; you? And you can but dream 
Of us, and in our image fashion them!" 
They do not know that they but speak in sleep 
Speaking vain words as sleepers do; that dreams 
Are fairer and more real than they are; 
That all this tossing of our freighted lives 
Is but the restless shadow of a dream; 
That the whole world, and we that walk in it, 
Sun, moon, and Stars, and the unageing sea, 
And all the happy humble life of plants, 
And the unthoughtful eager life of beasts, 
And all our loves, and birth, and death, are all 
Shadows, and a rejoicing spectacle 
Dreamed out of utter darkness and the void 
By that first, last, eternal soul of things, 
The shadow of whose brightness fashions us, 
That, for the clay of our eternity, 
It may behold itself as in a mirror. 
Shapes on a mirror, perishable shapes, 
Fleeting, and without substance, or abode 
In a fixed place, or knowledge of ourselves, 
Poor, fleeting, fretful, little arrogant shapes; 
Let us dream on, forgetting that: we dream! 
They dance, the daughters of Herodias, 
Everywhere in the world, and I behold 
Their rosy-petalled feet upon the air 
Falling and falling in a cadence soft 
As thoughts of beauty sleeping. Where they pass,
The wisdom which is wiser than things known, 
The beauty which is fairer than things seen, 
Dreams which are nearer to eternity 
Than that mot mortal tumult of the blood 
Which wars on itself in loving, droop and die. 
But they smile innocently, and dance on, 
Having no thought but this unslumbering thought:: 
"Am I not beautiful? Shall I not be loved?" 
Be patient, for they will not understand, 
Not till the end of time will they put by 
The weaving of slow Steps about men`s hearts. 
They shall be beautiful, they shall be loved. 
And though a man`s head falls because of them 
Whenever they have danced his soul asleep, 
It is not well that they should suffer wrong; 
For beauty is Still beauty, though it slay, 
And love is love, although it love to death. 
Pale, windy, and ecstatic multitude 
Beaten about this mortal air with winds 
Of an all but immortal passion, borne 
Upon the flight of thoughts that drooped their wings 
Into the cloud and twilight for your sake, 
Yours is the beauty of your own desire, 
And it shall wither only with that love 
Which gave it being. Dance in the desolate air, 
Dance always, daughters of Herodias, 
With your eternal, white, unfaltering feet, 
But dance, I pray you, so that I from fat- 
May hear your dancing fainter than the drift 
Of the last petals falling from the rose.
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