The Room Of Mirrors

I saw a room where many feet were dancing.     The ceiling and the wall were mirrors glancing     Both flames of candles and the heaven's light,     Though windows there were none for air or flight.     The room was in a form polygonal     Reached by a little door and narrow hall.     One could behold them enter for the dance,     And waken as it were out of a trance,     And either singly or with some one whirl:     The old, the young, full livers, boy and girl.     And every panel of the room was just     A mirrored door through which a hand was thrust     Here, there, around the room, a soul to seize     Whereat a scream would rise, but no surcease     Of music or of dancing, save by him     Drawn through the mirrored panel to the dim     And unknown space behind the flashing mirrors,     And by his partner struck through by the terrors     Of sudden loss.             And looking I could see     That scarcely any dancer here could free     His eyes from off the mirrors, but would gaze     Upon himself or others, till a craze     Shone in his eyes thus to anticipate     The hand that took each dancer soon or late.     Some analyzed themselves, some only glanced,     Some stared and paled and then more madly danced.     One dancer only never looked at all.     He seemed soul captured by the carnival.     There were so many dancers there he loved,     He was so greatly by the music moved,     He had no time to study his own face     There in the mirrors as from place to place     He quickly danced.             Until I saw at last     This dancer by the whirling dancers cast     Face full against a mirrored panel where     Before he could look at himself or stare     He plunged through to the other side - and quick,     As water closes when you lift the stick,     The mirrored panel swung in place and left     No trace of him, as 'twere a magic trick.     But all his partners thus so soon bereft     Went dancing to the music as before.     But I saw faces in that mirrored door     Anatomizing their forced smiles and watching     Their faces over shoulders, even matching     Their terror with each other's to repress     A growing fear in seeing it was less     Than some one else's, or to ease despair     By looking in a face who did not care,     While watching for the hand that through some door     Caught a poor dancer from the dancing floor     With every time-beat of the orchestra.     What is this room of mirrors? Who can say?