#1928 #IrishWriters #TheTower
I THOUGHT no more was needed Youth to prolong Than dumb-bell and foil To keep the body young. Oh, who could have foretold
Where had her sweetness gone? What fanatics invent In this blind bitter town, Fantasy or incident Not worth thinking of,
I know, although when looks meet I tremble to the bone, The more I leave the door unlatch… The sooner love is gone, For love is but a skein unwound
Edain came out of Midhir’s hill,… Beside young Aengus in his tower… Where time is drowned in odour-lad… And Druid moons, and murmuring of… And sleepy boughs, and boughs wher…
I FASTED for some forty days on… For passing round the bottle with… In country shawl or Paris cloak,… And what’s the good of women, for… Is fol de rol de rolly O.
If you, that have grown old, were… Neither catalpa tree nor scented l… Should hear my living feet, nor wo… Where we wrought that shall break… Let the new faces play what tricks…
SHE might, so noble from head To great shapely knees The long flowing line, Have walked to the altar Through the holy images
THIS great purple butterfly, In the prison of my hands, Has a learning in his eye Not a poor fool understands. Once he lived a schoolmaster
Where, where but here have pride a… That long to give themselves for w… To shake their wicked sides at you… Restraining reckless middle-age?
Though the great song return no mo… There’s keen delight in what we ha… The rattle of pebbles on the shore Under the receding wave.
When you are old and grey and full… And nodding by the fire, take down… And slowly read, and dream of the… Your eyes had once, and of their s… How many loved your moments of gla…
SAID lady once to lover, ‘None can rely upon A love that lacks its proper food; And if your love were gone How could you sing those songs of…
Once, when midnight smote the air, Eunuchs ran through Hell and met On every crowded street to stare Upon great Juan riding by: Even like these to rail and sweat
I WOULD be ignorant as the dawn That has looked down On that old queen measuring a town With the pin of a brooch, Or on the withered men that saw
I have old women’s secrets now That had those of the young; Madge tells me what I dared not t… When my blood was strong, And what had drowned a lover once