William Yeats - Poems

FIRST MERCHANT

There is a heap for each.

(SHEMUS goes to take money .)

But no, not yet,

For there's a work I have to set you to.

SHEMUS

So then you're as deceitful as the rest,

And all that talk of buying what's but a vapour

Is fancy bread. I might have known as much,

Because that's how the trick-o'-the-loop man talks.

FIRST MERCHANT

That's for the work, each has its separate price;

But neither price is paid till the work's done.

TEIG

The same for me.

MARY

Oh, God, why are you still?

FIRST MERCHANT

You've but to cry aloud at every cross-road,

At every house door, that we buy men's souls.

And give so good a price that all may live

In mirth and comfort till the famine's done,

Because we are Christian men.

SHEMUS

Come, let's away.

TEIG

I shall keep running till I've earned the price.

SECOND MERCHANT

( who has risen and gone towards fire )

Stop; you must have proof behind the words.

So here's your entertainment on the road.

( He throws a bag of money on the ground. )

Live as you please; our Master's generous.

(TEIG and SHEMUS have stopped . TEIG takes the money. They go out. )

MARY

Destroyers of souls, God will destroy you quickly.

You shall at last dry like dry leaves and hang

Nailed like dead vermin to the doors of God.

SECOND MERCHANT

Curse to your fill, for saints will have their dreams.

FIRST MERCHANT

Though we're but vermin that our Master sent

To overrun the world, he at the end

Shall pull apart the pale ribs of the moon

And quench the stars in the ancestral night.

MARY

God is all powerful.

SECOND MERCHANT

Pray, you shall need Him.

You shall eat dock and grass, and dandelion,

Till that low threshold there becomes a wall,

And when your hands can scarcely drag your body

We shall be near you.

(MARY faints .)

( The FIRST MERCHANT takes up the carpet, spreads it before the fire and stands in front of it warming his hands .)

FIRST MERCHANT

Our faces go unscratched,

Wring the neck o' that fowl, scatter the flour

And look if there is bread upon the shelves.

We'll turn the fowl upon the spit and roast it,

And eat the supper we were bidden to,

Now that the house is quiet, praise our Master,

And stretch and warm our heels among the ashes.

END OF SCENE I.

FRONT SCENE.— A wood with perhaps distant view of turreted house at one side, but all in flat colour, without light and shade and against a diapered or gold background.

COUNTESS CATHLEEN comes in leaning upon ALEEL'S arm . OONA follows them .

CATHLEEN ( stopping )

Surely this leafy corner, where one smells

The wild bee's honey, has a story too?

OONA

There is the house at last.

ALEEL

A man, they say,

Loved Maeve the Queen of all the invisible host,

And died of his love nine centuries ago.

And now, when the moon's riding at the full,

She leaves her dancers lonely and lies there

Upon that level place, and for three days

Stretches and sighs and wets her long pale cheeks.

CATHLEEN

So she loves truly.

ALEEL

No, but wets her cheeks,

Lady, because she has forgot his name.

CATHLEEN

She'd sleep that trouble away—though it must be

A heavy trouble to forget his name—

If she had better sense.

OONA

Your own house, lady.

ALEEL

She sleeps high up on wintry Knock-na-rea

In an old cairn of stones; while her poor women

Must lie and jog in the wave if they would sleep—

Being water born—yet if she cry their names

They run up on the land and dance in the moon

Till they are giddy and would love as men do,

And be as patient and as pitiful.

But there is nothing that will stop in their heads

They've such poor memories, though they weep for it.

Oh, yes, they weep; that's when the moon is full.

CATHLEEN

Is it because they have short memories

They live so long?

ALEEL

What's memory but the ash

That chokes our fires that have begun to sink?

And they've a dizzy, everlasting fire.

OONA

There is your own house, lady.

CATHLEEN

Why, that's true,

And we'd have passed it without noticing.

ALEEL

A curse upon it for a meddlesome house!

Had it but stayed away I would have known

What Queen Maeve thinks on when the moon is pinched;

And whether now—as in the old days—the dancers

Set their brief love on men.

OONA

Rest on my arm.

These are no thoughts for any Christian ear.

ALEEL

I am younger, she would be too heavy for you.

( He begins taking his lute out of the bag , CATHLEEN, who has turned towards OONA, turns back to him .)

This hollow box remembers every foot

That danced upon the level grass of the world,

And will tell secrets if I whisper to it.

( Sings. )

Lift up the white knee;

Hear what they sing,

Those young dancers

That in a ring

Raved but now

Of the hearts that brake

Long, long ago

For their sake.

OONA

New friends are sweet.

ALEEL

"But the dance changes.

Lift up the gown,

All that sorrow

Is trodden down."

OONA

The empty rattle-pate! Lean on this arm,

That I can tell you is a christened arm,

And not like some, if we are to judge by speech.

But as you please. It is time I was forgot.

Maybe it is not on this arm you slumbered

When you were as helpless as a worm.

ALEEL

Stay with me till we come to your own house.

CATHLEEN ( sitting down )

When I am rested I will need no help.

ALEEL

I thought to have kept her from remembering

The evil of the times for full ten minutes;

But now when seven are out you come between.

OONA

Talk on; what does it matter what you say,

For you have not been christened?

ALEEL

Old woman, old woman,

You robbed her of three minutes peace of mind,

And though you live unto a hundred years,

And wash the feet of beggars and give alms,

And climb Croaghpatrick, you shall not be pardoned.

OONA

How does a man who never was baptized

Know what Heaven pardons?

ALEEL

You are a sinful woman.

OONA

I care no more than if a pig had grunted.

( Enter CATHLEEN'S Steward .)

STEWARD

I am not to blame, for I had locked the gate,

The forester's to blame. The men climbed in

At the east corner where the elm-tree is.

CATHLEEN

I do not understand you, who has climbed?

STEWARD

Then God be thanked, I am the first to tell you.

I was afraid some other of the servants—

Though I've been on the watch—had been the first,

And mixed up truth and lies, your ladyship.

CATHLEEN ( rising )

Has some misfortune happened?

STEWARD

Yes, indeed.

The forester that let the branches lie

Against the wall's to blame for everything,

For that is how the rogues got into the garden.

CATHLEEN

I thought to have escaped misfortune here.

Has any one been killed?

STEWARD

Oh, no, not killed.

They have stolen half a cart-load of green cabbage.

CATHLEEN

But maybe they were starving.

STEWARD

That is certain.

To rob or starve, that was the choice they had.