W. B. Yeats

The Scholars

BALD heads forgetful of their sins,    
Old, learned, respectable bald heads    
Edit and annotate the lines    
That young men, tossing on their beds,    
Rhymed out in love’s despair          
To flatter beauty’s ignorant ear.    
 
They’ll cough in the ink to the world’s end;    
Wear out the carpet with their shoes    
Earning respect; have no strange friend;    
If they have sinned nobody knows.
Lord, what would they say    
Should their Catullus walk that way?

The Wild Swans at Coole. 1919.

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