William Butler
William Butler
Multi-instrumentalist for the band Arcade Fire who plays bass, synth, guitar, and percussion. He has also worked on movie soundtracks, like the one for Her.
ProfessionGuitarist
Date of Birth6 October 1982
simple men fire
Why should I blame her that she filled my days With misery, or that she would of late Have taught to ignorant men most violent ways, Or hurled the little streets upon the great, Had they but courage equal to desire? What could have made her peaceful with a mind That nobleness made simple as a fire, With beauty like a tightened bow, a kind That is not natural in an age like this Being high and solitary and most stern? Why, what could she have done, being what she is? Was there another Troy for her to burn?
memories confused men
The things a man has heard and seen are threads of life, and if he pull them carefully from the confused distaff of memory, any who will can weave them into whatever garments of belief please them best. I too have woven my garment like another, but I shall try to keep warm in it, and shall be well content if it do not unbecome me.
dream book hands
I bring you with reverent hands The books of my numberless dreams.
summer heart winter
Hearts with one purpose alone/Through summer and winter seem/Enchanted to a stone/To trouble the living stream.
dream dark night
Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths, Enwrought with golden and silver light, The blue and the dim and the dark cloths Of night and light and the half light, I would spread the cloths under your feet: But I, being poor, have only my dreams; I have spread my dreams under your feet; Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
blessed self common
The blessed spirits must be sought within the self which is common to all
faces knows
What do we know but that we face one another in this place?
beautiful sweet school
That beautiful mild woman for whose sake There's many a one shall find out all heartache On finding that her voice is sweet and low Replied, 'To be born a woman is to know- Although they do not talk of it at school - That we must labor to be beautiful.
christian writing heart
The creations of a great writer are little more than the moods and passions of his own heart, given surnames and Christian names, and sent to walk the earth.
peace water mind
We can make our minds so like still water that beings gather about us that they may see, it may be, their own images, and so live for a moment with a clearer, perhaps even with a fiercer life because of our quiet.
dream anxiety
Tread softly, for you tread on my dreams
dance ireland-and-the-irish fiddle
And the merry love the fiddle, and the merry love to dance.
dance sea play
When I play on my fiddle in Dooney Folk dance like a wave on the sea.
true-love believe love-is
True love is a discipline in which each divines the secret self of the other and refuses to believe in the mere daily self.