For some trivial affair
Or noisy, insolent sport,
Beauty that we have won
From bitterest hours;
Yet we, had we walked within
Those topless towers
Where Helen waked with her boy,
Had given but as the rest
Of the men and women of Troy,
A word and a jest.
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I TURN round
Neither know what I amNor where I go,My language beatenInto one name;I am in loveAnd that is my shame.What hurts the soulMy soul adores,No better than a beastUpon all fours.
I RANTED to the knave and fool,
Would transform the part,Fit audience found, but cannot ruleMy fanatic heart.I sought my betters: though in eachFine manners, liberal speech,Turn hatred into sport,Nothing said or done can reachMy fanatic heart,Out of Ireland have we come.Great hatred, little room,Maimed us at the start.I carry from my mother’s wombA fanatic heart.
THAT civilisation may not sink,
Quiet the dog, tether the ponyTo a distant post;Our master Caesar is in the tentWhere the maps are spread,His eyes fixed upon nothing,A hand under his head.Like a long-legged fly upon the streamHis mind moves upon silence.That the topless towers be burntAnd men recall that face,Move most gently if move you mustIn this lonely place.She…
A CURSING rogue with a merry face,
Stumbled upon that windy placeCalled Cruachan, and it was as muchAs the one sturdy leg could doTo keep him upright while he cursed.He had counted, where long years agoQueen Maeve’s nine Maines had been nursed,A pair of lapwings, one old sheep,And not a house to the plain’s edge,When close to his right hand a heapOf…
I WOULD be ignorant as the dawn
On that old queen measuring a townWith the pin of a brooch,Or on the withered men that sawFrom their pedantic BabylonThe careless planets in their courses,The stars fade out where the moon comes.And took their tablets and did sums;I would be ignorant as the dawnThat merely stood, rocking the glittering coachAbove the cloudy shoulders of…
WHEN the flaming lute-thronged angelic door is wide;
Our hearts endure the scourge, the plaited thorns, the wayCrowded with bitter faces, the wounds in palm and side,The vinegar-heavy sponge, the flowers by Kedron stream;We will bend down and loosen our hair over you,That it may drop faint perfume, and be heavy with dew,Lilies of death-pale hope, roses of passionate dream.