William Yeats - The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats. Volume 2 of 8

Who’s speaking? Who are you?

Come out of this!

Have pity on us, that must beg our bread
From table to table throughout the entire world,
And yet be hungry.

But why were you born crooked?
What bad poet did your mothers listen to
That you were born so crooked?

Come away!
Maybe he’s cursed the food, and it might kill us.

Yes, better come away.

He has great strength
And great patience to hold his right hand there,
Uplifted, and not wavering about.
He is much stronger than I am, much stronger.

Say nothing! I will get him out of this
Before I have said a word of food and drink;
For while he is on this threshold and can hear,
It may be, the voices that made mock of him,
He would not listen. I’d be alone with him.

Seanchan! Seanchan!

Can you not hear me, Seanchan?
It is myself.

Is this your hand, Fedelm?
I have been looking at another hand
That is up yonder.

I have come for you.

Fedelm, I did not know that you were here.

And can you not remember that I promised
That I would come and take you home with me
When I’d the harvest in? And now I’ve come,
And you must come away, and come on the instant.

Yes, I will come. But is the harvest in?
This air has got a summer taste in it.

But is not the wild middle of the summer
A better time to marry? Come with me now!

Who taught you that? For it’s a certainty,
Although I never knew it till last night,
That marriage, because it is the height of life,
Can only be accomplished to the full
In the high days of the year. I lay awake:
There had come a frenzy into the light of the stars,
And they were coming nearer, and I knew
All in a minute they were about to marry
Clods out upon the ploughlands, to beget
A mightier race than any that has been.
But some that are within there made a noise,
And frighted them away.

Come with me now!
We have far to go, and daylight’s running out.

The stars had come so near me that I caught
Their singing. It was praise of that great race
That would be haughty, mirthful, and white-bodied,
With a high head, and open hand, and how,
Laughing, it would take the mastery of the world.

But you will tell me all about their songs
When we’re at home. You have need of rest and care,
And I can give them you when we’re at home.
And therefore let us hurry, and get us home.

It’s certain that there is some trouble here,
Although it’s gone out of my memory.
And I would get away from it. Give me your help. [ Trying to rise.
But why are not my pupils here to help me?
Go, call my pupils, for I need their help.

Come with me now, and I will send for them,
For I have a great room that’s full of beds
I can make ready; and there is a smooth lawn
Where they can play at hurley and sing poems
Under an apple-tree.

I know that place:
An apple-tree, and a smooth level lawn
Where the young men can sway their hurley sticks.

The four rivers that run there,
Through well-mown level ground,
Have come out of a blessed well
That is all bound and wound
By the great roots of an apple,
And all the fowl of the air
Have gathered in the wide branches
And keep singing there.

No, there are not four rivers, and those rhymes
Praise Adam’s paradise.

I can remember now,
It’s out of a poem I made long ago
About the Garden in the East of the World,
And how spirits in the images of birds
Crowd in the branches of old Adam’s crabtree.
They come before me now, and dig in the fruit
With so much gluttony, and are so drunk
With that harsh wholesome savour, that their feathers
Are clinging one to another with the juice.
But you would lead me to some friendly place,
And I would go there quickly.

Come with me.

But why am I so weak? Have I been ill?
Sweetheart, why is it that I am so weak?

I’ll dip this piece of bread into the wine,
For that will make you stronger for the journey.

Yes, give me bread and wine; that’s what I want,
For it is hunger that is gnawing me.

But, no; I must not eat it.

Eat, Seanchan.
For if you do not eat it you will die.

Why did you give me food? Why did you come?
For had I not enough to fight against
Without your coming?

Eat this little crust,
Seanchan, if you have any love for me.

I must not eat it – but that’s beyond your wit.
Child! child! I must not eat it, though I die.

You do not know what love is; for if you loved,
You would put every other thought away.
But you have never loved me.

You, a child,
Who have but seen a man out of the window,
Tell me that I know nothing about love,
And that I do not love you! Did I not say
There was a frenzy in the light of the stars
All through the livelong night, and that the night
Was full of marriages? But that fight’s over,
And all that’s done with, and I have to die.