William Butler Yeats

Somewhere beyond the curtain Of distorting days Lives that lonely thing That shone before these eyes Targeted, trod like Spring.

So long as all is ordered for attack, and that alone, leaders will instinctively increase the number of enemies that they may give their followers something to do.

I wonder anybody does anything at Oxford but dream and remember

Ecstasy is from the contemplation of things vaster than the individual and imperfectly seen perhaps, by all those that still live.

In dreams begin responsibilitiy.

I kiss you and kiss you, With arms around my own, Ah, how shall I miss you, When, dear, you have grown.

If what I say resonates with you, it's merely because we're branches of the same tree.

For to articulate sweet sounds together Is to work harder than all these, and yet Be thought an idler by the noisy set Of bankers, schoolmasters, and clergymen The martyrs call the world.

but one loses, as one grows older, something of the lightness of one's dreams; one begins to take life up in both hands, and to care more for the fruit than the flower, and that is no great loss perhaps.

I knew a phoenix in my youth, so let them have their day.

When I think of all the books I have read, and of the wise words I have heard spoken, and of the anxiety I have given to parents and grandparents, and of the hopes that I have had, all life weighed in the scales of my own life seems to me a preparation for something that never happens.

Beloved, gaze in thine own heart, The holy tree is growing there; From joy the holy branches start, And all the trembling flowers they bear. The changing colours of its fruit Have dowered the stars with metry light; The surety of its hidden root Has planted quiet in the night; The shaking of its leafy head Has given the waves their melody, And made my lips and music wed, Murmuring a wizard song for thee.

His element is so fine _x000D_ _x000D_ Being sharpened by his death, _x000D_ _x000D_ To drink from the wine-breath _x000D_ _x000D_ While our gross palates drink from the whole wine.

Hammer your thoughts into unity.

That beautiful mild woman for whose sake There's many a one shall find out all heartache On finding that her voice is sweet and low Replied, 'To be born a woman is to know- Although they do not talk of it at school - That we must labor to be beautiful.

The Irishman sustains himself during brief periods of joy by the knowledge that tragedy is just around the corner.

We have fallen in the dreams the ever-living Breathe on the tarnished mirror of the world, And then smooth out with ivory hands and sigh.

Only God, my dear, Could love you for yourself alone And not your yellow hair.

I spit into the face of time that has transfigured me

Nor law, nor duty bade me fight, Nor public men, nor cheering crowds, A lonely impulse of delight Drove to this tumult in the clouds.

The unpurged images of day recede; The Emperor's drunken soldiery are abed; Night resonance recedes, night-walkers' song After great cathedral gong.