Ribbons from your dancing shoes In shreds and threads and feeling used Are hanging up our yesterdays Down the street, the empty dance halls Due to empty circumstance All seem to be closed down today And through the silence I hear the word for love I hear the word for death But I don't hear any answer While death can talk of 'la mort' And love can whisper 'l'amour' The floor has lost its dancers Take your partner by the hand And dance the ghost of a sarabande Moving like a miracle Shoe to shoe and cheek to cheek Every day of every week Step by step by century Through the silence