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W. B. Yeats

W. B. Yeats

Mad as the Mist and Snow

Bolt and bar the shutter,
For the foul winds blow:
Our minds are at their best this night,
And I seem to know
That everything outside us is
Mad as the mist and snow.
 
Horace there by Homer stands,
Plato stands below,
And here is Tully’s open page.
How many years ago
Were you and I unlettered lads
Mad as the mist and snow?
 
You ask what makes me sigh, old friend,
What makes me shudder so?
I shudder and I sigh to think
That even Cicero
And many-minded Homer were
Mad as the mist and snow.

#IrishWriters

Other works by W. B. Yeats...
The Lady’s Third Song

WHEN you and my true lover meet And he plays tunes between your fe… Speak no evil of the soul, Nor think that body is the whole, For I that am his daylight lady
To a Young Beauty

DEAR fellow-artist, why so free With every sort of company, With every Jack and Jill? Choose your companions from the be… Who draws a bucket with the rest
Crazy Jane Talks With the Bishop

I met the Bishop on the road And much said he and I. ‘Those breasts are flat and fallen… Those veins must soon be dry; Live in a heavenly mansion,
The Pity of Love

A PITY beyond all telling Is hid in the heart of love: The folk who are buying and sellin… The clouds on their journey above, The cold wet winds ever blowing,
 1
Three Movements

Shakespearean fish swam the sea, f… Romantic fish swam in nets coming… What are all those fish that lie g…
The Black Tower

SAY that the men of the old black… Though they but feed as the goathe… Their money spent, their wine gone… Lack nothing that a soldier needs, That all are oath-bound men:
 2
The Heart of the Woman

O what to me the little room That was brimmed up with prayer an… He bade me out into the gloom, And my breast lies upon his breast… O what to me my mother’s care,
 5
Love Song

My love, we will go, we will go,… And away in the woods we will scat… And the salmon behold, and the ous… My love, we will hear, I and you,… The calling afar of the doe and th…
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The Hosting of the Sidhe

The host is riding from Knocknare… And over the grave of Clooth-na-B… Caoilte tossing his burning hair, And Niamh calling Away, come away… Empty your heart of its mortal dre…
Peace

Ah, that Time could touch a form That could show what Homer’s age Bred to be a hero’s wage. ‘Were not all her life but storm, Would not painters paint a form
 1
The Delphic Oracle Upon Plotinus

Behold that great Plotinus swim, Buffeted by such seas; Bland Rhadamanthus beckons him, But the Golden Race looks dim, Salt blood blocks his eyes.
A Faery Song

We who are old, old and gay, O so old! Thousands of years, thousands of y… If all were told: Give to these children, new from t…
The Hawk

‘CALL down the hawk from the air… Let him be hooded or caged Till the yellow eye has grown mild… For larder and spit are bare, The old cook enraged,
The Everlasting Voices

O sweet everlasting Voices, be st… Go to the guards of the heavenly f… And bid them wander obeying your w… Flame under flame, till Time be n… Have you not heard that our hearts…
To a Wealthy Man Who Promised a Second Subscription to the Dublin Municipal Gallery If It Were Proved the People Wanted Pictures

YOU gave, but will not give again Until enough of paudeen’s pence By Biddy’s halfpennies have lain To be 'some sort of evidence’, Before you’ll put your guineas dow…



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