William Butler Yeats Quotes
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I have nothing more to give you than my heart. Spanish saying Hearts are not to be had as a gift hearts are to be earned.
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All the stream that's roaring by Came out of a needle's eye.
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to be choked with hate May well be of all evil chances chief.
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Come, fix upon me that accusing eye. I thirst for accusation. All that was sung. All that was said in Ireland is a lie Breed out of the contagion of the throng, Saving the rhyme rats hear before they die.
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Test every work of intellect or faith, And everything that your own hands have wrought And call those works extravagance of breath That are not suited for such men as come Proud, open-eyed and laughing to the tomb.
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The soul of man is of the imperishable substance of the stars!
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While Michael Angelo's Sistine roof, His "Morning" and his "Night" disclose How sinew that has been pulled tight, Or it may be loosened in repose, Can rule by supernatural right Yet be but sinew.
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I know, although when looks meet I tremble to the bone, The more I leave the door unlatched The sooner love is gone.
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But was there ever dog that praised his fleas?
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Some burn damp faggots, others may consume The entire combustible world in one small room.
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Farewell - farewell, For I am weary of the weight of time.
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A daughter of a King of Ireland, heard A voice singing on a May Eve like this, And followed half awake and half asleep, Until she came into the Land of Faery, Where nobody gets old and godly and grave, Where nobody gets old and crafty and wise, Where nobody gets old and bitter of tongue. And she is still there, busied with a dance Deep in the dewy shadow of a wood, Or where stars walk upon a mountain-top.
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I believe... that our memories are part of one great memory, the memory of Nature herself.
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Processions that lack high stilts have nothing that catches the eye. What if my great-granddad had a pair that were twenty foot high, And mine were but fifteen foot, no modern stalks upon higher, Some rogue of the world stole them to patch up a fence or a fire.
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I had still the ambition, formed in Sligo in my teens, of living in imitation of Thoreau on Innisfree, a little island in Lough Gill, and when walking through Fleet Street very homesick I heard a little tinkle of water and saw a fountain in a shop window which balanced a little ball upon its jet, and began to remember lake water. From the sudden remembrance came my poem Innisfree.
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for never yet Has lover lived, but longed to wive Like them that are no more alive.
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What the world's million lips are searching for, must be substantial somewhere.
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The women that I picked spoke sweet and low And yet gave tongue. "Hound voices" were they all.
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Choose your companions from the best; Who draws a bucket with the rest soon topples down the hill.
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Never shall a young man, Thrown into despair By those great honey-coloured Ramparts at your ear, Love you for yourself alone And not your yellow hair.
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I, too, await The hour of thy great wind of love and hate. When shall the stars be blown about the sky, Like the sparks blown out of a smithy, and die?
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The tragedy of sexual intercourse is the perpetual virginity of the soul.
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For men were born to pray and save: Romantic Ireland's dead and gone, It's with O'Leary in the grave.
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Earth in beauty dressed Awaits returning spring. All true love must die, Alter at the best Into some lesser thing. Prove that I lie.