Harriet Monroe, ed. (18601936). Poetry: A Magazine of Verse. 191222. | | The Moons Orchestra | By John Gould Fletcher |
| From Down the Mississippi WHEN the moon lights up | |
Its dull red camp-fire through the trees; | |
And floats out, like a white balloon, | |
Into the blue cup of the night, borne by a casual breeze; | |
The moon-orchestra then begins to stir: | 5 |
Jiggle of fiddles commence their crazy dance in the darkness; | |
Crickets churr | |
Against the stark reiteration of the rusty flutes which frogs | |
Puff at from rotted logs | |
In the swamp. | 10 |
And the moon begins her dance of frozen pomp | |
Over the lightly quivering floor of the flat and mournful river. | |
Her white feet slightly twist and swirl | |
She is a mad girl | |
In an old unlit ball-room, | 15 |
Whose walls, half-guessed-at through the gloom, | |
Are hung with the rusty crape of stark black cypresses, | |
Which show, through gaps and tatters, red stains half hidden away. | | | |
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