To A Friend Whose Work Has Come To Nothing
July 6, 2023Three Songs To The Same Tune
July 6, 2023Three Things
`O cruel Death, give three things back,’
Sang a bone upon the shore;
`A child found all a child can lack,
Whether of pleasure or of rest,
Upon the abundance of my breast’:
A bone wave-whitened and dried in the wind.
`Three dear things that women know,’
Sang a bone upon the shore;
`A man if I but held him so
When my body was alive
Found all the pleasure that life gave’:
A bone wave-whitened and dried in the wind.
`The third thing that I think of yet,’
Sang a bone upon the shore,
`Is that morning when I met
Face to face my rightful man
And did after stretch and yawn’:
A bone wave-whitened and dried in the wind.
William Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) was an Irish poet, playwright, and political activist who was one of the most important figures of the Irish literary revival. He is known for his use of Irish mythology and for his exploration of the themes of love, death, and rebirth. His most famous works include "The Tower" and "The Wild Swans at Coole." Yeats was also a senator in the Irish Free State and was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923.