"Danse Russe" is an early poem by William Carlos Williams, published in 1916, about a young father dancing alone in front of a mirror. Williams was a major figure in the Imagism and Modernism literary movements. In his poetry, he focused on paring down his word choice to communicate imagery as directly as possible. Along with other poets in these movements, Williams saw his writing as a reaction against the perceived excess of Romantic poetry. This simplicity is on display in this particular poem, as Williams captures a minor moment occurring in the early morning of a small home.
The poem begins at dawn, as the speaker's wife and baby are asleep. He describes the sun outside his window before providing a lengthy depiction of himself dancing naked in front of his mirror. He waves his shirt around his head and sings a song to himself quietly. He then catalogs various parts of his body before declaring himself the possible "happy genius" of his household. The poem is a lighthearted one that makes use of its unusual premise. In this private moment, the speaker experiences a meaningful examination of himself. Briefly apart from his wife and child, the speaker has an instance of levity.
The poem is not as spare as some of Williams's later works. It contains punctuation, and some of the lines are end-stopped. The slightly more ornamental style of this particular work can likely be explained by the enduring influence of Walt Whitman on Williams in this earlier period of his writing. However, it still demonstrates much of the same imagistic immediacy for which he would become renowned. Additionally, the content of the poem is well within Williams's typical subject matter. He is taking an everyday event and elevating it with his keen eye.
