William Yeats - Poems

CATHLEEN

A learned theologian has laid down

That starving men may take what's necessary,

And yet be sinless.

OONA

Sinless and a thief!

There should be broken bottles on the wall.

CATHLEEN

And if it be a sin, while faith's unbroken

God cannot help but pardon. There is no soul

But it's unlike all others in the world,

Nor one but lifts a strangeness to God's love

Till that's grown infinite, and therefore none

Whose loss were less than irremediable

Although it were the wickedest in the world.

( Enter TEIG and SHEMUS.)

STEWARD

What are you running for? Pull off your cap,

Do you not see who's there?

SHEMUS

I cannot wait.

I am running to the world with the best news

That has been brought it for a thousand years.

STEWARD

Then get your breath and speak.

SHEMUS

If you'd my news

You'd run as fast and be as out of breath.

TEIG

Such news, we shall be carried on men's shoulders.

SHEMUS

There's something every man has carried with him

And thought no more about than if it were

A mouthful of the wind; and now it's grown

A marketable thing!

TEIG

And yet it seemed

As useless as the paring of one's nails.

SHEMUS

What sets me laughing when I think of it,

Is that a rogue who's lain in lousy straw,

If he but sell it, may set up his coach.

TEIG ( laughing )

There are two gentlemen who buy men's souls.

CATHLEEN

O God!

TEIG

And maybe there's no soul at all.

STEWARD

They're drunk or mad.

TEIG

Look at the price they give.

( Showing money. )

SHEMUS ( tossing up money )

"Go cry it all about the world," they said.

"Money for souls, good money for a soul."

CATHLEEN

Give twice and thrice and twenty times their money,

And get your souls again. I will pay all.

SHEMUS

Not we! not we! For souls—if there are souls—

But keep the flesh out of its merriment.

I shall be drunk and merry.

TEIG

Come, let's away.

( He goes. )

CATHLEEN

But there's a world to come.

SHEMUS

And if there is,

I'd rather trust myself into the hands

That can pay money down than to the hands

That have but shaken famine from the bag.

( He goes out R.)

( Lilting )

"There's money for a soul, sweet yellow money.

There's money for men's souls, good money, money."

CATHLEEN ( to ALEEL)

Go call them here again, bring them by force,

Beseech them, bribe, do anything you like;

(ALEEL goes .)

And you too follow, add your prayers to his.

(OONA, who has been praying, goes out .)

Steward, you know the secrets of my house.

How much have I?

STEWARD

A hundred kegs of gold.

CATHLEEN

How much have I in castles?

STEWARD

As much more.

CATHLEEN

How much have I in pasture?

STEWARD

As much more.

CATHLEEN

How much have I in forests?

STEWARD

As much more.

CATHLEEN

Keeping this house alone, sell all I have,

Go barter where you please, but come again

With herds of cattle and with ships of meal.

STEWARD

God's blessing light upon your ladyship.

You will have saved the land.

CATHLEEN

Make no delay.

( He goes L.)

(ALEEL and OONA return )

CATHLEEN

They have not come; speak quickly.

ALEEL

One drew his knife

And said that he would kill the man or woman

That stopped his way; and when I would have stopped him

He made this stroke at me; but it is nothing.

CATHLEEN

You shall be tended. From this day for ever

I'll have no joy or sorrow of my own.

OONA

Their eyes shone like the eyes of birds of prey.

CATHLEEN

Come, follow me, for the earth burns my feet

Till I have changed my house to such a refuge

That the old and ailing, and all weak of heart,

May escape from beak and claw; all, all, shall come

Till the walls burst and the roof fall on us.

From this day out I have nothing of my own.

( She goes. )

OONA ( taking ALEEL by the arm and as she speaks bandaging his wound )

She has found something now to put her hand to,

And you and I are of no more account

Than flies upon a window-pane in the winter.

( They go out. )

END OF SCENE II.

Scene.— Hall in the house of Countess Cathleen. At the Left an oratory with steps leading up to it. At the Right a tapestried wall, more or less repeating the form of the oratory, and a great chair with its back against the wall. In the Centre are two or more arches through which one can see dimly the trees of the garden. Cathleen is kneeling in front of the altar in the oratory; there is a hanging lighted lamp over the altar . Aleel enters .

ALEEL

I have come to bid you leave this castle and fly

Out of these woods.

CATHLEEN

What evil is there here

That is not everywhere from this to the sea?

ALEEL

They who have sent me walk invisible.

CATHLEEN

So it is true what I have heard men say,

That you have seen and heard what others cannot.

ALEEL

I was asleep in my bed, and while I slept

My dream became a fire; and in the fire

One walked and he had birds about his head.

CATHLEEN

I have heard that one of the old gods walked so.

ALEEL

It may be that he is angelical;

And, lady, he bids me call you from these woods.

And you must bring but your old foster-mother,

And some few serving men, and live in the hills,

Among the sounds of music and the light

Of waters, till the evil days are done.

For here some terrible death is waiting you,

Some unimagined evil, some great darkness

That fable has not dreamt of, nor sun nor moon

Scattered.

CATHLEEN

No, not angelical.

ALEEL

This house

You are to leave with some old trusty man,

And bid him shelter all that starve or wander

While there is food and house room.

CATHLEEN

He bids me go

Where none of mortal creatures but the swan

Dabbles, and there you would pluck the harp, when the trees

Had made a heavy shadow about our door,

And talk among the rustling of the reeds,

When night hunted the foolish sun away

With stillness and pale tapers. No—no—no!

I cannot. Although I weep, I do not weep

Because that life would be most happy, and here

I find no way, no end. Nor do I weep

Because I had longed to look upon your face,

But that a night of prayer has made me weary.

ALEEL ( prostrating himself before her )

Let Him that made mankind, the angels and devils

And dearth and plenty, mend what He has made,

For when we labour in vain and eye still sees

Heart breaks in vain.

CATHLEEN

How would that quiet end?

ALEEL

How but in healing?

CATHLEEN

You have seen my tears

And I can see your hand shake on the floor.

ALEEL ( faltering )

I thought but of healing. He was angelical.

CATHLEEN ( turning away from him )

No, not angelical, but of the old gods,

Who wander about the world to waken the heart—

The passionate, proud heart—that all the angels,

Leaving nine heavens empty, would rock to sleep.

( She goes to chapel door; ALEEL holds his clasped hands towards her for a moment hesitatingly, and then lets them fall beside him .)