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Tuesday, October 5, 2021

William Carlos Williams

 DANSE RUSSE

If I when my wife is sleeping 
and the baby and Kathleen 
are sleeping 
and the sun is a flame-white disc 
in silken mists 
above shining trees,— 
if I in my north room 
dance naked, grotesquely 
before my mirror 
waving my shirt round my head

and singing softly to myself: 
'I am lonely, lonely. 
I was born to be lonely, 
I am best so! ' 
If I admire my arms, my face, 
my shoulders, flanks, buttocks 
against the yellow drawn shades,— 

Who shall say I am not 
the happy genius of my household?

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