Or I had no woman there to kiss;
So slept for half a year or so;

But year by year I found that less
Gave me such pleasure I'd forgo

Even a half-hour's nothingness,
And when at one year's end I found

I had not waked a single minute,
I chosc this burrow under ground.

I'll sleep away all time within it:
My sleep were now nine centuries

But for those mornings when I find
The lapwing at their foolish dies

And the sheep bleating at the wind
As when I also played the fool.'

The beggar in a rage began
Upon his hunkers in the hole,

"It's plain that you are no right man
To mock at everything I love

As if it were not worth, the doing.
I'd have a merry life enough

If a good Easter wind were blowing,
And though the winter wind is bad

I should not be too down in the mouth
For anything you did or said

If but this wind were in the south.'
"You cty aloud, O would 'twere spring

Or that the wind would shift a point,
And do not know that you would bring,

If time were suppler in the joint,
Neither the spring nor the south wind

But the hour when you shall pass away
And leave no smoking wick behind,

For all life longs for the Last Day
And there's no man but cocks his ear

To know when Michael's trumpet cries
"That flesh and bone may disappear,

And souls as if they were but sighs,
And there be nothing but God left;

But, I aone being blessed keep
Like some old rabbit to my cleft

And wait Him in a drunken sleep.'
He dipped his ladle in the tub

And drank and yawned and stretched him out,
The other shouted, "You would rob

My life of every pleasant thought
And every comfortable thing,

And so take that and that." Thereon
He gave him a great pummelling,

But might have pummelled at a stone
For all the sleeper knew or cared;

And after heaped up stone on stone,
And then, grown weary, prayed and cursed

And heaped up stone on stone again,
And prayed and cursed and cursed and bed

From Maeve and all that juggling plain,
Nor gave God thanks till overhead

The clouds were brightening with the dawn.
THE LADY'S SECOND SONG

WHAT sort of man is coming
To lie between your feet?

What matter, we are but women.
Wash; make your body sweet;

I have cupboards of dried fragrance.
I can strew the sheet.

i{The Lord have mercy upon us.}
He shall love my soul as though

Body were not at all,
He shall love your body

Untroubled by the soul,
Love cram love's two divisions

Yet keep his substance whole.
i{The Lord have mercy upon us.}

Soul must learn a love that is
proper to my breast,

Limbs a Love in common
With every noble beast.

If soul may look and body touch,
Which is the more blest?

i{The Lord have mercy upon us.}
THE LEADERS OF THE CROWD

THEY must to keep their certainty accuse
All that are different of a base intent;

Pull down established honour; hawk for news
Whatever their loose fantasy invent

And murmur it with bated breath, as though
The abounding gutter had been Helicon

Or calumny a song. How can they know
Truth flourishes where the student's lamp has shone,

And there alone, that have no Solitude?
So the crowd come they care not what may come.

They have loud music, hope every day renewed
And heartier loves; that lamp is from the tomb.

THE LOVER ASKS FORGIVENESS BECAUSE OF HIS MANY MOODS
IF this importunate heart trouble your peace

With words lighter than air,
Or hopes that in mere hoping flicker and cease;

Crumple the rose in your hair;
And cover your lips with odorous twilight and say,

"O Hearts of wind-blown flame!
O Winds, older than changing of night and day,

That murmuring and longing came
From marble cities loud with tabors of old

In dove-grey faery lands;
From battle-banners, fold upon purple fold,

Queens wrought with glimmering hands;
That saw young Niamh hover with love-lorn face

Above the wandering tide;
And lingered in the hiddendesolate place

Where the last Phoenix died,
And wrapped the flames above his holy head;

And still murmur and long:
O piteous Hearts, changing till change be dead

In a tumultuous song':
And cover the pale blossoms of your breast

With your dim heavy hair,
And trouble with a sigh for all things longing for rest

The odorous twilight there.
THE LOVER PLEADS WITH HIS FRIEND FOR OLD FRIENDS

THOUGH you are in your shining days,
Voices among the crowd

And new friends busy with your praise,
Be not unkind or proud,

But think about old friends the most:
Time's bitter flood will rise,

Your beauty perish and be lost
For all eyes but these eyes.

THE LOVER'S SONG
BIRD sighs for the air,

Thought for I know not where,
For the womb the seed sighs.

Now sinks the same rest
On mind, on nest,

On straining thighs.
THE MASK

"PUT off that mask of burning gold
With emerald eyes."

"O no, my dear, you make so bold
To find if hearts be wild and wise,

And yet not cold."
"I would but find what's there to find,

Love or deceit."
"It was the mask engaged your mind,

And after set your heart to beat,
Not what's behind."

"But lest you are my enemy,
I must enquire."

"O no, my dear, let all that be;
What matter, so there is but fire

In you, in me?"
THE MOUNTAIN TOMB

POUR wine and dance if manhood still have pride,
Bring roses if the rose be yet in bloom;

The cataract smokes upon the mountain side,
Our Father Rosicross is in his tomb.

Pull down the blinds, bring fiddle and clarionet
That there be no foot silent in the room

Nor mouth from kissing, nor from wine unwet;
Our Father Rosicross is in his tomb.

In vain, in pain; the cataract still cries;
The everlasting taper lights the gloom;

All wisdom shut into his onyx eyes,
Our Father Rosicross sleeps in his tomb.

THE OLD MEN ADMIRING THEMSELVES IN THE WATER
I HEARD the old, old men say,

"Everything alters,
And one by one we drop away."

They had hands like claws, and their knees
Were twisted like the old thorn-trees

By the waters.
I heard the old, old men say,

"All that's beautiful drifts away
Like the waters."

THE PHASES OF THE MOON
i{An old man cocked his car upon a bridge;}

i{He and his friend, their faces to the South,}
i{Had trod the uneven road. Their hoots were soiled,}

i{Their Connemara cloth worn out of shape;}
i{They had kept a steady pace as though their beds,}

i{Despite a dwindling and late-risen moon,}
i{Were distant still. An old man cocked his ear.}

i{Aherne.} What made that Sound?
i{Robartes.} A rat or water-hen

Splashed, or an otter slid into the stream.
We are on the bridge; that shadow is the tower,

And the light proves that he is reading still.
He has found, after the manner of his kind,

Mere images; chosen this place to live in
Because, it may be, of the candle-light

From the far tower where Milton's Platonist
Sat late, or Shelley's visionary prince:

The lonely light that Samuel Palmer engraved,
An image of mysteriouswisdom won by toil;

And now he seeks in book or manuscript
What he shall never find.

i{Ahernc.} Why should not you
Who know it all ring at his door, and speak

Just truth enough to show that his whole life
Will scarcely find for him a broken crust

Of all those truths that are your daily bread;
And when you have spoken take the roads again?

i{Robartes.} He wrote of me in that extravagant style

• beggar [´begə] n.乞丐 (初中英语单词)
• rabbit [´ræbit] n.兔子，野兔 (初中英语单词)
• drunken [´drʌŋkən] a.喝醉的；常醉的 (初中英语单词)
• breath [breθ] n.呼吸；气息 (初中英语单词)
• twilight [´twailait] n.黎明；黄昏 (初中英语单词)
• marble [´mɑ:bəl] n.大理石 a.大理石的 (初中英语单词)
• purple [´pə:pl] n.紫色 a.紫(红)的 (初中英语单词)
• wrought [rɔ:t] work 的过去式(分词) (初中英语单词)
• hidden [´hid(ə)n] hide 的过去分词 (初中英语单词)
• perish [´periʃ] v.灭亡；消灭；(使)死去 (初中英语单词)
• wisdom [´wizdəm] n.智慧，聪明，才智 (初中英语单词)
• reading [´ri:diŋ] n.(阅)读；朗读；读物 (初中英语单词)
• lonely [´ləunli] a.孤独的；无人烟的 (初中英语单词)
• mysterious [mi´stiəriəs] a.神秘的；难以理解的 (初中英语单词)
• spoken [´spəukən] speak的过去分词 (初中英语单词)
• burrow [´bʌrəu] n.洞穴 v.(打)洞；查阅 (高中英语单词)
• easter [´i:stə] n.(耶稣)复活节 (高中英语单词)
• trumpet [´trʌmpit] n.喇叭；小号 (高中英语单词)
• certainty [´sə:tənti] n.确实(性)；确信 (高中英语单词)
• forgiveness [fə´givnis] n.原谅，饶恕；宽仁 (高中英语单词)
• flicker [´flikə] n.&v.闪烁；忽隐忽现 (高中英语单词)
• longing [´lɔŋiŋ] n.&a.渴望(的) (高中英语单词)
• desolate [´desəleit] a.荒凉的；孤独的 (高中英语单词)
• manhood [´mænhud] n.人格；男子气概 (高中英语单词)
• everlasting [,evə´lɑ:stiŋ] a.永久的，无尽的 (高中英语单词)
• extravagant [ik´strævəgənt] a.奢侈的；过度的 (高中英语单词)
• blessed [´blesid] a.享福的；神圣的 (英语四级单词)
• gutter [´gʌtə] n.(檐)槽；排水沟 (英语四级单词)
• unkind [,ʌn´kaind] a.不客气的；不和善的 (英语四级单词)
• emerald [´emərəld] n.纯绿宝石；翠绿色 (英语四级单词)
• cataract [´kætərækt] n.大瀑布；白内障 (英语四级单词)
• fiddle [´fidl] n.小提琴 v.拉提琴 (英语四级单词)
• uneven [ʌn´i:vən] a.崎岖的；不匀的 (英语四级单词)
• bridge [bridʒ] n.桥(梁)；鼻梁；桥牌 (英语四级单词)
• sleeper [´sli:pə] n.睡眠者；(铁路)枕木 (英语六级单词)
• fantasy [´fæntəsi] n.幻想(曲)，想象 (英语六级单词)
• palmer [´pɑ:mə] n.朝圣者；变戏法的人 (英语六级单词)