Classic Poem

And now for music. Play a racy tune——
perhaps a waltz. Or let it be some jazz.
Dance. Sway. Sing to the maudlin strain.
Dance. Sing. But I am going outside. I am going out to look once more on the rising moon.
I see the moon in the east, low in the east.
I smell the nicotiana that grows by the door.
Dance and sing, O younger than I,
while I am outside——
while I look on the moon——
while I smell the nicotiana that grows by the door.

Far off in the east,
beyond the lake,
the forest ranges, black, deep black——
a tattered fringe of lusterless jet
bordering the shimmering silk of the waters.
Over the forest
there looms a huge cloud, black, deep black, except for a border of burnished gold——
the gold of the rising moon.
I am going outside to look on the burnished gold.
I am going outside to smell the nicotiana.

I once knew a lady who lived by night——
(softer music than yours, and sweeter, was that of the long ago)——
I knew a lady whose very soul was the burnished gold of moonlit clouds,
and with the burnished gold the scent of nicotiana.

Dance, O younger than I. Sing.
Dance and sing away your youth.
Hum. Sway to the racy jazz.
But above your jazz I hear too clearly a strain from the music of the long ago;
and, though the past is to me like darkness without a moon,
I see too clearly the lady who lived by night. Dance——

dance, O younger than I. Sing.
Dance and sing away your youth.
Hum. Sway to the racy jazz.
I, too, would dance.
I, too, would sing.
I would forget the lady who lived by night. But I——
I shall remain outside,
with the burnished gold of the moonlit cloud,
the scent of the nicotiana.