25POINTS
As on all its sides a kitchen-match darts white
flickering tongues before it bursts into flame:
with the audience around her, quickened, hot,
her dance begins to flicker in the dark room.

5 And all at once it is completely fire.

One upward glance and she ignites her hair
and, whirling faster and faster, fans her dress
into passionate flames, till it becomes a furnace
from which, like startled rattlesnakes, the long
10 naked arms uncoil, aroused and clicking.

And then: as if the fire were too tight
around her body, she takes and flings it out
haughtily, with an imperious gesture,
and watches: it lies raging on the floor,
15 still blazing up, and the flames refuse to die -
Till, moving with total confidence and a sweet
exultant smile, she looks up finally
and stamps it out with powerful small feet.


What is compared in the first stanza?

the dance and a kitchen match when it is first struck
the dancer and a kitchen match when it is first struck
the dancer and the brilliant flame of a kitchen match
the audience and the heat from a lighted kitchen match


What is the meaning of imperious as it is used in Line 13?

commanding
assaultive
compulsory
insulting