William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeatswas an Irish poet and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years he served as an Irish Senator for two terms. Yeats was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival and, along with Lady Gregory, Edward Martyn, and others, founded the Abbey Theatre, where he served as its chief during its early years. In 1923, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth13 June 1865
CitySandymount, Ireland
CountryIreland
Time drops in decay,Like a candle burnt out,And the mountains and woodsHave their day, have their day;
Time drops in decay, Like a candle burnt out, And the mountains and woods Have their day, have their day;
Time to put off the world and go somewhereAnd find my health again in the sea air,"Beggar to beggar cried, being frenzy-struck,"And make my soul before my pate is bare.
Where beauty has no ebb, decay no flood, But joy is wisdom, time an endless song.
The years like great black oxen tread the world, and God the herdsman treads them on behind, and I am broken by their passing feet.
Land of Heart's Desire, Where beauty has no ebb, decay no flood, But joy is wisdom, time an endless song.
What can be shown? What true love be? All could be known or shown If Time were but gone.
An aged man is but a paltry thing, a tattered coat upon a stick
The innocent and the beautiful have no enemy but time.
My chair was nearest to the fire In every company That talked of love or politics, Ere Time transfigured me.
The years like great black oxen tread the world, and God, the herdsman goads them on behind, and I am broken by their passing feet.
And pluck till time and times are done the silver apples of the moon the golden apples of the sun.
And God, the herdsman, goads them on behind.
But O, sick children of the world, Of all the many changing things In dreary dancing past us whirled, To the cracked tune that Chronos sings, Words alone are certain good.