Poems by William Butler Yeats

Here at right of the entrance this bronze head,

I Made my song a coat

The Danann children laugh, in cradles of wrought gold,

That crazed girl improvising her music.

Others because you did not keep

(My Soul) I summon to the winding ancient stair;

I Dreamed that one had died in a strange place

Wine comes in at the mouth

Come swish around, my pretty punk,

We who are old, old and gay,

I admit the briar

Sickness brought me this

What lively lad most pleasured me

I

Though nurtured like the sailing moon

Endure what life God gives and ask no longer span;

We should be hidden from their eyes,

O bid me mount and sail up there

Like the moon her kindness is,

We sat under an old thorn-tree

I have pointed out the yelling pack,

A crazy man that found a cup,

Laughter not time destroyed my voice

A mermaid found a swimming lad,

I have old women’s secrets now

For one throb of the artery,

The moments passed as at a play;

On thrones from China to Peru

What woman hugs her infant there?

All the stream that's roaring by

I Bring you with reverent hands

Once more the storm is howling, and half hid

Bid a strong ghost stand at the head

God guard me from those thoughts men think

God grant a blessing on this tower and cottage

I Thought no more was needed

My mother dandled me and sang,

Whence did all that fury come?

She might, so noble from head

If any man drew near

I

We sat together at one summer's end,

Fasten your hair with a golden pin,

I Wander by the edge

Pale brows, still hands and dim hair,

The powers whose name and shape no living creature knows

I dreamed that I stood in a valley, and amid sighs,

O cloud-pale eyelids, dream-dimmed eyes

All things uncomely and broken, all things worn out and old,

Half close your eyelids, loosen your hair,

Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,

Were you but lying cold and dead,

Speech after long silence; it is right,

O Heart, be at peace, because

i(Epilogue to "A Vision')

All things can tempt me from this craft of verse:

Saddle and ride, I heard a man say,

I walk through the long schoolroom questioning;

Picture and book remain,

Being out of heart with government

(He.) Never until this night have I been stirred.

I know that I shall meet my fate

A i(little Indian temple) in i(the Golden Age.) Around it i(a garden;)

This great purple butterfly,

I call on those that call me son,

The heron-billed pale cattle-birds

There where the course is,

Dear Craoibhin Aoibhin, look into our case.

ARGUMENT. i(Baile and Aillinn were lovers, but Aengus, the)

Beautiful lofty things: O'Leary's noble head;

If I make the lashes dark

‘Time to put off the world and go somewhere

Blessed be this place,

Although you hide in the ebb and flow

There is grey in your hair.

I Whispered, "I am too young,"

The unpurged images of day recede;

The lot of love is chosen. I learnt that much

Here is fresh matter, poet,

While I, from that reed-throated whisperer

The Colonel went out sailing,

(Chorus.) Come praise Colonus' horses, and come praise

Come gather round me, Parnellites,

If Jupiter and Saturn meet,

O but there is wisdom

I meditate upon a swallow's flight,

I meditate upon a swallow's flight,

I know, although when looks meet

Bring me to the blasted oak

I found that ivory image there

That lover of a night

'Love is all

I am tired of cursing the Bishop,

I care not what the sailors say:

I met the Bishop on the road

A man that had six mortal wounds, a man

A man came slowly from the setting sun,

Nor dread nor hope attend

For certain minutes at the least

Down by the salley gardens my love and I did meet;

I have met them at close of day

Hic. On the grey sand beside the shallow stream

"Your eyes that once were never weary of mine

Although crowds gathered once if she but showed her face,

She hears me strike the board and say

(Fergus.) This whole day have I followed in the rocks,

"Never shall a young man,

I

Now must I these three praise,

Parnell's Funeral

Overcome -- O bitter sweetness,

I went out alone

What they undertook to do

O Where is our Mother of Peace

O, Curlew, cry no more in the air,

O, Colleens, kneeling by your altar rails long hence,

As the moon sidles up

I hear the Shadowy Horses, their long manes a-shake,

Fasten your hair with a golden pin,

I wander by the edge

Do you not hear me calling, white deer with no horns?

When my arms wrap you round I press

O Curlew, cry no more in the air,

I dreamed that I stood in a valley, and amid sighs,

O cloud-pale eyelids, dream-dimmed eyes,

I have drunk ale from the Country of the Young

Half close your eyelids, loosen your hair,

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,

Were you but lying cold and dead,

She is foremost of those that I would hear praised.

Processions that lack high stilts have nothing that

I Swayed upon the gaudy stern

There is a queen in China, or maybe it’s in Spain,

Because we love bare hills and stunted trees

A most astonishing thing --

Five-and-twenty years have gone

I

A man I praise that once in Tara's Hals

I have heard the pigeons of the Seven Woods

Out-worn heart, in a time out-worn,

Pardon, old fathers, if you still remain

A Bloody and a sudden end,

‘Would it were anything but merely voice!’

I have heard that hysterical women say

A sudden blow: the great wings beating still

When have I last looked on

That civilisation may not sink,

Where has Maid Quiet gone to,

What's riches to him

I

One had a lovely face,

I am worn out with dreams;

Civilisation is hooped together, brought

If this importunate heart trouble your peace

I hear the Shadowy Horses, their long manes a-shake,

When my arms wrap you round I press

I asked if I should pray.

Do you not hear me calling, white deer with no horns!

I have drunk ale from the Country of the Young

Book I

Never give all the heart, for love

There all the golden codgers lay,

Many ingenious lovely things are gone

Why should I blame her that she filled my days

Sweetheart, do not love too long:

In tombs of gold and lapis lazuli

O thought, fly to her when the end of day

Your hooves have stamped at the black margin of the wood,

She that but little patience knew,

I think it better that in times like these

Where, where but here have Pride and Truth,

Once, when midnight smote the air,

May God be praised for woman

A strange thing surely that my Heart, when love had come unsought

PARNELL'S FUNERAL

Indignant at the fumbling wits, the obscure spite

Ah, that Time could touch a form

How can I, that girl standing there,

This night has been so strange that it seemed

Where had her sweetness gone?

Some may have blamed you that you took away

The old brown thorn-trees break in two high over Cummen Strand,

I ranted to the knave and fool,

Pardon, old fathers, if you still remain

Because you have found me in the pitch-dark night

Why should I seek for love or study it?

An abstract Greek absurdity has crazed the man --

What matter that you understood no word!

I say that Roger Casement

As I came over Windy Gap

I

What need you, being come to sense,

i(Shepherd.) That cry's from the first cuckoo of the year.

O but we talked at large before

Slim adolescence that a nymph has stripped,

And thus declared that Arab lady:

Sang Solomon to Sheba,

We that have done and thought,

"Those Platonists are a curse," he said,

Through intricate motions ran

I

The girl goes dancing there

Swift has sailed into his rest;

A storm beaten old watch-tower,

She lived in storm and strife,

Because there is safety in derision

I thought of your beauty, and this arrow,

Once, when midnight smote the air,

The old priest Peter Gilligan

Good Father John O'Hart

Come round me, little childer;

'Lay me in a cushioned chair;

Hands, do what you’re bid;

Say that the men of the old black tower,

Cumhal called out, bending his head,

The jester walked in the garden:

The cat went here and there

How came this ranger

From pleasure of the bed,

The intellect of man is forced to choose

I sought a theme and sought for it in vain,

"What do you make so fair and bright?"

Suddenly I saw the cold and rook-delighting Heaven

Would I could cast a sail on the water

Though leaves are many, the root is one;

I Had this thought awhile ago,

All the heavy days are over;

Crazed through much child-bearing

You ask what -- I have found, and far and wide I go:

I would be ignorant as the dawn

There was a green branch hung with many a bell

Behold that great Plotinus swim,

A Doll in the doll-maker’s house

On the grey rock of Cashel the mind’s eye

O sweet everlasting Voices be still;

Autumn is over the long leaves that love us,

The Fascination of what’s difficult

When I play on my fiddle in Dooney,

Although you hide in the ebb and flow

Although I can see him still,

One that is ever kind said yesterday:

When all works that have

He with body waged a fight,

O what has made that sudden noise?

Kusta Ben Luka is my name, I write

Hurrah for revolution and more cannon-shot!

Poets with whom I learned my trade,

The gyres! the gyres! Old Rocky Face, look forth;

Edain came out of Midhir's hill, and lay

‘Call down the hawk from the air;

O what to me the little room

O’Driscoll drove with a song,

The host is riding from Knocknarea

A one-legged, one-armed, one-eyed man,

He said we might choose the subject for the lesson

The island dreams under the dawn

I passed along the water's edge below the humid trees,

I turn round

What sort of man is coming

When you and my true lover meet

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,

Although I shelter from the rain

They must to keep their certainty accuse

I’ll say and maybe dream I have drawn content—

If this importunate heart trouble your peace

Pale brows, still hands and dim hair,

Though you are in your shining days,

O women, kneeling by your altar-rails long hence,

All things uncomely and broken, all things worn out

Bird sighs for the air,

I sat on cushioned otter-skin:

Now as at all times I can see in the mind’s eye,

i(Man)

He stood among a crowd at Dromahair;

‘Put off that mask of burning gold

You waves, though you dance by my feet like children

Time drops in decay,

The threefold terror of love; a fallen flare

Pour wine and dance if Manhood still have pride,

Around me the images of thirty years:

If you, that have grown old, were the first dead,

Though the great song return no more

Sing of the O'Rahilly,

i(A certain poet in outlandish clothes)

I heard the old, old men say,

A statesman is an easy man,

What's riches to him

‘What have I earned for all that work,’ I said,

An old man cocked his ear upon a bridge;

I fasted for some forty days on bread and buttermilk,

My mother dandled me and sang,

i(Three Voices together].) Hurry to bless the hands that play,

Though you are in your shining days,

O hurry where by water among the trees

Hope that you may understand!

Acquaintance; companion;

Rose of all Roses, Rose of all the World!

If Michael, leader of God's host

Who dreamed that beauty passes like a dream?

"O words are lightly spoken,"

Shepherd That cry’s from the first cuckoo of the year

Hunchback. Stand up and lift your hand and bless

Bald heads forgetful of their sins,

Turning and turning in the widening gyre

Far off, most secret, and inviolate Rose,

i(The First.) My great-grandfather spoke to Edmund Burke

A Dramatic Poem

The woods of Arcady are dead,

I Rise in the dawn, and I kneel and blow

I went out to the hazel wood,

The brawling of a sparrow in the eaves

Poetry, music, I have loved, and yet

You think it horrible that lust and rage

I Lived among great houses,

Pythagoras planned it. Why did the people stare?

Where dips the rocky highland

‘Though to my feathers in the wet,

Said lady once to lover,

Three old hermits took the air

They hold their public meetings where

SAILING TO BYZANTIUM

When the flaming lute-thronged angelic door is wide;

King Eochaid came at sundown to a wood

Beloved, gaze in thine own heart,

The Danaan children laugh, in cradles of wrought gold,

The dews drop slowly and dreams gather: unknown spears

‘The man that I praise,’

Through winter-time we call on spring,

I would that we were, my beloved, white birds on the

Because I am mad about women I am mad about the hills," Said that wild old wicked man Who travels where God wills. "Not to die on the straw at home. Those hands to close these eyes, That is all I ask, my dear, From the old man in the skies. i(Daybrea

The trees are in their autumn beauty,

IN MEMORY OF EVA GORE-BOOTH AND CON MARKIEWICZ

Toil and grow rich,

I cried when the moon was murmuring to the birds:

I Whispered, ‘I am too young,’

There all the barrel-hoops are knit,

These are the clouds about the fallen sun,

What if I bade you leave

Remember all those renowned generations,

Shakespearean fish swam the sea, far away from land;

The Roaring Tinker if you like,

I

I

Now all the truth is out,

You say, as I have often given tongue

If you have revisited the town, thin Shade,

Come play with me;

You gave but will not give again

Dear fellow-artist, why so free

My dear, my dear, I know

Shy one, Shy one,

I, The poet William Yeats,

Stretch towards the moonless midnight of the trees,

Know, that I would accounted be

Be you still, be you still, trembling heart;

While I wrought out these fitful Danaan rhymes,

i(Red Rose, proud Rose, sad Rose of all my days!)

‘Though logic choppers rule the town,

Was it the double of my dream

I saw a staring virgin stand

A speckled cat and a tame hare

I

Has no one said those daring

I

Do not because this day I have grown saturnine

I have no happiness in dreaming of Brycelinde,

‘Although I’d lie lapped up in linen

I

How should the world be luckier if this house,

I

The Heavenly Circuit; Berenice's Hair;

He holds him from desire, all but stops his breathing

His chosen comrades thought at school

I sing what was lost and dread what was won,

We have cried in our despair

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,

Eternity is passion, girl or boy

Who will go drive with Fergus now,

Why should not old men be mad?

The true faith discovered was

I had this thought a while ago,

Crazy Jane And The Bishop

Much did I rage when young,