Dance in Poetry

The only book of its kind, this anthology of poems about dance puts forward several interrelated ideas: that poetry is itself a form that resembles dance, that the difficulties of writing about dance in prose are avoided in poetry, and that dance is a "language" that crosses cultures and centuries. Selections include Leonard Cohen's "Last Dance at the Four Penny," Babette Deutsche's "Ballet School," Li-Po's "Dancing Girl," Howard Nemerov's "The Dancer's Reply," Arthur Rimbaud's "Gibbet Dance," Anne Sexton's "How We Danced," and Yevgeny Yevtushenko's "Doing the Twist on Nails." Short profiles of the poets and sources for their poems are also included.

Alkis Raftis is vice president of the International Organization of Folk Art and president of the Dora Stratou Greek Dance Theatre in Athens.