Canto I. <br /> <br />XXVIII. <br /> <br />The day had fled, the moon arose, <br />Night straight began with evening's close-- <br />A night whose calm and silvery sheen <br />Befitted well the wild yapeen.1 <br />Within the circle of the camp <br />Blazed the clear fire, while measured tramp <br />Of dancing warriors shook the ground, <br />To song and time-sticks' throbbing sound. <br />There twice two hundred feet advanced, <br />There twice a hundred malkas2 glanced <br />Bright in the moon, that silvered o'er <br />The arms that all those malkas bore. <br />Wild the device, and strange the sign <br />That stared in many a snowy line <br />From beaming face and heaving breast, <br />And limbs that seldom paused to rest; <br />Whilst all the rib-like lines laid on, <br />Made each man seem a skeleton. <br />Nodded the feathers from the red <br />And netted band that bound each head, <br />And hoarsely rustling leaves of trees <br />Shook round dark ankles in the breeze. <br />The singers with their time-sticks rang <br />The cadence of the song they sang; <br />And every face and limb below, <br />And tree above them, caught the glow <br />That spread from camp-fire's rising blaze, <br />Lighting the yapeen's wond'rous maze <br />Of feet and ankles in the dance <br />With fitful gleam or twinkling glance. <br /> <br />XXIX <br /> <br />Conspicuous 'mid the dancing crowd, <br />Whose ranks alternate swayed and bowed, <br />Shone Mamba, tricked with wild design, <br />And symbol traced in waving line. <br />No limbs more active wore the green <br />At yon great Ghim-boboke3 yapeen; <br />And no two arms more graceful there <br />In circling motion cleft the air <br />Than his--and his the eagle-eye <br />Inspiring all the minstrelsy. <br />The young and old in groups around <br />Drank in the sight, the joy, the sound; <br />And Mamba's form throughout the dance <br />Attraced every wondering glance.<br /><br />George Gordon McCrae<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/mamba-the-bright-eyed-an-aboriginal-reminiscence/
