Quote

The friends that have it I do wrong Whenever I remake a song, Should know what issue is at stake: It is myself that I remake.

William Butler Yeats

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

William Butler Yeats
Age: 73 †
Born: 1865
Born: June 13
Died: 1939
Died: January 28
Astrologer
Mystic
Playwright
Poet
Politician
Writer
Scrooby
Nottinghamshire
W. B. Yeats
William Yeats
W.B. Yeats
Crafts
Issue
Whenever
Friendship
Issues
Remake
Friends
Remakes
Wrong
Stake
Song
Stakes

More quotes by William Butler Yeats

Image
We are closed in, and the key is turned / On our uncertainty.
William Butler Yeats
Image
A spot whereon the founders lived and died Seemed once more dear than life ancestral trees, Or gardens rich in memory glorified Marriages, alliances, and families, And every bride's ambition satisfied.
William Butler Yeats
Image
And there's a score of duchesses, surpassing womankind, Or who have found a painter to make them so for pay And smooth out stain and blemish with the elegance of his mind: I knew a phoenix in my youth, so let them have their day.
William Butler Yeats
Image
Words are always getting conventionalized to some secondary meaning. It is one of the works of poetry to take the truants in custody and bring them back to their right senses.
William Butler Yeats
Image
Locke sank into a swoon The Garden died God took the spinning-jenny Out of his side.
William Butler Yeats
Image
And a softness came from the starlight and filled me full to the bone.
William Butler Yeats
Image
People are responsible for their opinions, but Providence is responsible for their morals.
William Butler Yeats
Image
Labor is blossoming or dancing where The body is not bruised to pleasure soul, Nor beauty born out of its own despair, Nor blear-eyed wisdom out of midnight oil. O chestnut tree, great-rooted blossomer, Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole? O body swayed to music, O brightening glance How can we know the dancer from the dance?
William Butler Yeats
Image
Time can but make her beauty over again.
William Butler Yeats
Image
Any fool can fight a winning battle, but it needs character to fight a losing one, and that should inspire us which reminds me that I dreamed the other night that I was being hanged, but was the life and soul of the party.
William Butler Yeats
Image
Man is in love and loves what vanishes, What more is there to say?
William Butler Yeats
Image
Chaunt in his ear delusions magical, That he may fight the horses of the sea. The Druids took them to their mystery, And chaunted for three days.
William Butler Yeats
Image
I made my song a coat Covered with embroideries Out of old mythologies From heel to throat But the fools caught it, Wore it in the world's eyes As though they'd wrought it. Song, let them take it, For there's more enterprise In walking naked.
William Butler Yeats
Image
Much did I rage when young, Being by the world oppressed, But now with flattering tongue It speeds the parting guest.
William Butler Yeats
Image
All that could run or leap or swim Whether in wood, water or cloud, Acclaiming, proclaiming, declaiming Him.
William Butler Yeats
Image
Some burn damp faggots, others may consume The entire combustible world in one small room.
William Butler Yeats
Image
Irish poets, learn your trade, sing whatever is well made, scorn the sort now growing up all out of shape from toe to top.
William Butler Yeats
Image
Pale brows, still hands and dim hair, I had a beautiful friend And dreamed that the old despair Would end in love in the end.
William Butler Yeats
Image
The Danaan children laugh, in cradles of wrought gold, And clap their hands together, and half close their eyes, For they will ride the North when the ger-eagle flies, With heavy whitening wings, and a heart fallen cold.
William Butler Yeats
Image
Speech after long silence it is right, All other lovers being estranged or dead . . . That we descant and yet again descant Upon the supreme theme of Art and Song: Bodily decrepitude is wisdom young We loved each other and were ignorant.
William Butler Yeats