Classic Poem

Listen, O child of woe,
What is the band below
Starting to play?
Where the great halls aglow
Gladness betray?

Let us begin the dance,
Waltz in a dizzy trance;—
Madame, the pleasure?—
In the mad whirl to prance
To the wild measure!

Waltzing and spinning,
In lovely beginning
To twirl to the brink;
With a kiss at the inning
Ere deathward we sink!

Paolo, thy memory,—
Thine too, Francesca, be
Clear in my mind;
Wild be our dance and free,
Dizzy and blind!—

Waltzing and spinning,
In lovely beginning
To twirl to the brink;
With a kiss for our sinning
Ere deathward we sink!