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I have read somewhere that in the Emperor's palace at Byzantium was a tree made of gold and silver, and artificial birds that sang.
William Butler Yeats
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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
Bird
Palace
Gold
Palaces
Tree
Emperor
Read
Sang
Made
Artificial
Birds
Silver
Somewhere
Byzantium
More quotes by William Butler Yeats
I bear a burden that might well try Men that do all by rule, And what can I That am a wandering-witted fool But pray to God that He ease My great responsibilities?
William Butler Yeats
Mock mockers after that That would not lift a hand maybe To help good, wise or great To bar that foul storm out, for we Traffic in mockery.
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What can books of men that wive In a dragon-guarded land, Paintings of the dolphin-drawn Sea-nymphs in their pearly wagons Do, but awake a hope to live...?
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How can I, that girl standing there, My attention fix On Roman or on Russian Or on Spanish politics?
William Butler Yeats
All things can tempt me from this craft of verse: One time it was a woman's face, or worse-- The seeming needs of my fool-driven land Now nothing but comes readier to the hand Than this accustomed toil.
William Butler Yeats
Myself I must remake.
William Butler Yeats
It is so many years before one can believe enough in what one feels even to know what the feeling is
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An age is the reversal of an age: When strangers murdered Emmet, Fitzgerald, Tone, We lived like men that watch a painted stage. What matter for the scene, the scene once gone: It had not touched our lives.
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And many a poor man that has roved Loved and thought himself beloved From a glad kindness cannot take his eyes.
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I sat on cushioned otter-skin: My word was law from Ith to Emain, And shook at Invar Amargin The hearts of the world-troubling seamen, And drove tumult and war away.
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Nor seek, for this is also sooth, To hunger fiercely after truth, Lest all thy toiling only breeds New dreams, new dreams there is no truth Saving in thine own heart.
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I summon to the winding ancient stair Set all your mind upon the steep ascent
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A mermaid found a swimming lad, Picked him up for her own, Pressed her body to his body, Laughed and plunging down Forgot in cruel happiness That even lovers drown.
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yet it seems Life scarce can cast a fragrance on the wind, Scarce spread a glory to the morning beams, But the torn petals strew the garden plot And there's but common greenness after that.
William Butler Yeats
You ask what I have found and far and wide I go, Nothing but Cromwell's house and Cromwell's murderous crew, The lovers and the dancers are beaten into the clay, And the tall men and the swordsmen and the horsemen where are they?
William Butler Yeats
Once out of nature I shall never take My bodily form from any natural thing, But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make Of hammered gold and gold enameling To keep a drowsy Emperor awake Or set upon a golden bough to sing To lords and ladies of Byzantium Of what is past, or passing, or to come.
William Butler Yeats
I thought no more was needed Youth to prolong Than dumb-bell and foil To keep the body young. O who could have foretold That the heart grows old?
William Butler Yeats
The light of lights looks always on the motive, not the deed, the shadow of shadows on the deed alone.
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And learn that the best thing is To change my loves while dancing And pay but a kiss for a kiss.
William Butler Yeats
Overcome the Empyrean hurl Heaven and Earth out of their places, That in the same calamity Brother and brother, friend and friend, Family and family, City and city may contend.
William Butler Yeats
