The Dance Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: AABBCCDDEEFFGGHHIIDD JJKKLLMMNNLL| See how like lightest waves at play the airy dancers fleet | A |
| And scarcely feels the floor the wings of those harmonious feet | A |
| Ob are they flying shadows from their native forms set free | B |
| Or phantoms in the fairy ring that summer moonbeams see | B |
| As by the gentle zephyr blown some light mist flees in air | C |
| As skiffs that skim adown the tide when silver waves are fair | C |
| So sports the docile footstep to the heave of that sweet measure | D |
| As music wafts the form aloft at its melodious pleasure | D |
| Now breaking through the woven chain of the entangled dance | E |
| From where the ranks the thickest press a bolder pair advance | E |
| The path they leave behind them lost wide open the path beyond | F |
| The way unfolds or closes up as by a magic wand | F |
| See now they vanish from the gaze in wild confusion blended | G |
| All in sweet chaos whirled again that gentle world is ended | G |
| No disentangled glides the knot the gay disorder ranges | H |
| The only system ruling here a grace that ever changes | H |
| For ay destroyed for ay renewed whirls on that fair creation | I |
| And yet one peaceful law can still pervade in each mutation | I |
| And what can to the reeling maze breathe harmony and vigor | D |
| And give an order and repose to every gliding figure | D |
| That each a ruler to himself doth but himself obey | J |
| Yet through the hurrying course still keeps his own appointed way | J |
| What would'st thou know It is in truth the mighty power of tune | K |
| A power that every step obeys as tides obey the moon | K |
| That threadeth with a golden clue the intricate employment | L |
| Curbs bounding strength to tranquil grace and tames the wild enjoyment | L |
| And comes the world's wide harmony in vain upon thine ears | M |
| The stream of music borne aloft from yonder choral spheres | M |
| And feel'st thou not the measure which eternal Nature keeps | N |
| The whirling dance forever held in yonder azure deeps | N |
| The suns that wheel in varying maze That music thou discernest | L |
| No Thou canst honor that in sport which thou forgettest in earnest | L |
Friedrich Schiller
(1)
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