The following sections of this BookRags Literature Study Guide is offprint from Gale's For Students Series: Presenting Analysis, Context, and Criticism on Commonly Studied Works: Introduction, Author Biography, Plot Summary, Characters, Themes, Style, Historical Context, Critical Overview, Criticism and Critical Essays, Media Adaptations, Topics for Further Study, Compare & Contrast, What Do I Read Next?, For Further Study, and Sources.
(c)1998-2002; (c)2002 by Gale. Gale is an imprint of The Gale Group, Inc., a division of Thomson Learning, Inc. Gale and Design and Thomson Learning are trademarks used herein under license.
The following sections, if they exist, are offprint from Beacham's Encyclopedia of Popular Fiction: "Social Concerns", "Thematic Overview", "Techniques", "Literary Precedents", "Key Questions", "Related Titles", "Adaptations", "Related Web Sites". (c)1994-2005, by Walton Beacham.
The following sections, if they exist, are offprint from Beacham's Guide to Literature for Young Adults: "About the Author", "Overview", "Setting", "Literary Qualities", "Social Sensitivity", "Topics for Discussion", "Ideas for Reports and Papers". (c)1994-2005, by Walton Beacham.
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Table of Contents | |
Section | Page |
Start of eBook | 1 |
1 | |
IMMORTALITY | 1 |
THE GREAT BREATH | 2 |
THE BURNING GLASS | 2 |
REST | 3 |
DIVINE VISITATION | 4 |
APHRODITE | 4 |
BABYLON | 5 |
KRISHNA | 6 |
SUNG ON A BY-WAY | 6 |
THE VISION OF LOVE | 7 |
JANUS | 8 |
THE MEMORY OF EARTH | 8 |
THREE COUNSELLORS | 9 |
THE PLACE OF REST | 9 |
RECONCILIATION | 10 |
FOR BRIAN WHEN HE IS GROWN UP THIS HANDFUL OF THE NUTS OF KNOWLEDGE I HAVE GATHERED ON THE SECRET STREAMS.
I thought, beloved, to have
brought to you
A gift of quietness and ease
and peace,
Cooling your brow as with
the mystic dew
Dropping from twilight trees.
Homeward I go not yet; the
darkness grows;
Not mine the voice to still
with peace divine:
From the first fount the stream
of quiet flows
Through other hearts than
mine.
Yet of my night I give to
you the stars,
And of my sorrow here the
sweetest gains,
And out of hell, beyond its
iron bars,
My scorn of all its pains.
THE NUTS OF KNOWLEDGE
A cabin on the mountain side
hid in a grassy nook
Where door and windows open
wide that friendly stars may look.
The rabbit shy can patter
in, the winds may enter free,
Who throng around the mountain
throne in living ecstasy.
And when the sun sets dimmed
in eve and purple fills the air,
I think the sacred Hazel Tree
is dropping berries there
From starry fruitage waved
aloft where Connla’s Well o’erflows;
For sure the enchanted waters
pour through every wind that blows.
I think when night towers
up aloft and shakes the trembling dew
How every high and lonely
thought that thrills my being through
Is but a ruddy berry dropped
down through the purple air,
And from the magic tree of
life the fruit falls everywhere.
We must pass like smoke or
live within the spirit’s fire;
For we can no more than smoke
unto the flame return
If our thought has changed
to dream, our will unto desire,
As smoke we vanish though
the fire may burn.
Lights of infinite pity star
the grey dusk of our days:
Surely here is soul:
with it we have eternal breath:
In the fire of love we live,
or pass by many ways,
By unnumbered ways of dream
to death.
THE HERMIT
Now the quietude of earth
Nestles deep my heart within;
Friendships new and strange
have birth
Since I left the city’s
din.
Here the tempest stays its
guile,
Like a big kind brother plays,
Romps and pauses here awhile
From its immemorial ways.
Now the silver light of dawn
Slipping through the leaves
that fleck
My one window, hurries on,
Throws its arms around my
neck.
Darkness to my doorway hies,
Lays her chin upon the roof,
And her burning seraph eyes
Now no longer keep aloof.
Here the ancient mystery
Holds its hands out day by
day,
Takes a chair and croons with
me
By my cabin built of clay.
When the dusky shadow flits,
By the chimney nook I see
Where the old enchanter sits,
Smiles, and waves, and beckons
me.
Its edges foamed with amethyst
and rose,
Withers once more the old
blue flower of day:
There where the ether like
a diamond glows
Its petals fade away.
A shadowy tumult stirs the
dusky air;
Sparkle the delicate dews,
the distant snows;
The great deep thrills for
through it everywhere
The breath of beauty blows.
I saw how all the trembling
ages past,
Moulded to her by deep and
deeper breath,
Neared to the hour when Beauty
breathes her last
And knows herself in death.
THE DIVINE VISION
This mood hath known all beauty
for it sees
O’erwhelmed majesties
In these pale forms, and kingly
crowns of gold
On brows no longer bold,
And through the shadowy terrors
of their hell
The love for which they fell,
And how desire which cast
them in the deep
Called God too from his sleep.
O, pity, only seer, who looking
through
A heart melted like dew,
Seest the long perished in
the present thus,
For ever dwell in us.
Whatever time thy golden eyelids
ope
They travel to a hope;
Not only backward from these
low degrees
To starry dynasties,
But, looking far where now
the silence owns
And rules from empty thrones,
Thou seest the enchanted halls
of heaven burn
For joy at our return.
Thy tender kiss hath memory
we are kings
For all our wanderings.
Thy shining eyes already see
the after
In hidden light and laughter.
A shaft of fire that falls
like dew,
And melts and maddens all
my blood,
From out thy spirit flashes
through
The burning glass of womanhood.
Only so far; here must I stay:
Nearer I miss the light, the
fire:
I must endure the torturing
ray,
And, with all beauty, all
desire.
Ah, time-long must the effort
be,
And far the way that I must
go
To bring my spirit unto thee,
Behind the glass, within the
glow.
A VISION OF BEAUTY
Where we sat at dawn together,
while the star-rich heavens shifted,
We were weaving dreams in
silence, suddenly the veil was lifted.
By a hand of fire awakened,
in a moment caught and led
Upward to the wondrous vision:
through the star-mists overhead
Flare and flaunt the monstrous
highlands; on the sapphire coast of night
Fall the ghostly froth and
fringes of the ocean of the light.
Many coloured shine the vapours:
On me to rest, my bird, my
bird:
The swaying branches of my
heart
Are blown by every wind toward
The home whereto their wings
depart.
Build not your nest, my bird,
on me:
I know no peace but ever sway:
O, lovely bird, be free, be
free,
On the wild music of the day.
But sometimes when your wings
would rest,
And winds are laid on quiet
eves:
Come, I will bear you breast
to breast,
And lap you close with loving
leaves.
THE EARTH BREATH
From the cool and dark-lipped
furrow breathes a dim delight
Through the woodland’s
purple plumage to the diamond night.
Aureoles of joy encircle every
blade of grass
Where the dew-fed creatures
silent and enraptured pass.
And the restless ploughman
pauses, turns, and wondering,
Deep beneath his rustic habit
finds himself a king;
For a fiery moment looking
with the eyes of God
Over fields a slave at morning
bowed him to the sod.
Blind and dense with revelation
The heavens lay hold on us:
the starry rays
Fondle with flickering fingers
brow and eyes:
A new enchantment lights the
ancient skies.
What is it looks between us
gaze on gaze?
Does the wild spirit of the
endless days
Chase through my heart some
lure that ever flies?
Only I know the vast within
me cries
Finding in thee the ending
of all ways.
Ah, but they vanish; the immortal
train
From thee, from me, depart,
yet take from thee
Memorial grace: laden
with adoration
Forth from this heart they
flow that all in vain
Would stay the proud eternal
powers that flee
After the chase in burning
exultation.
THE MASTER SINGER
A laughter in the diamond
air, a music in the trembling grass;
And one by one the words of
light as joydrops through my being pass.
I am the sunlight in the heart,
the silver moonglow in the mind;
My laughter runs and ripples
through the wavy tresses of the wind.
I am the fire upon the hills,
the dancing flame that leads afar
Each burning-hearted wanderer,
and I the dear and homeward star.
A myriad lovers died for me,
and in their latest yielded breath
I woke in glory giving them
immortal life though touched by death.
They knew me from the dawn
of time: if Hermes beats his rainbow wings,
If Angus shakes his locks
of light, or golden-haired Apollo sings,
It matters not the name, the
land; my joy in all the gods abides:
Even in the cricket in the
grass some dimness of me smiles and hides.
For joy of me the day star
glows, and in delight and wild desire
The peacock twilight rays
aloft its plumes and blooms of shadowy fire,
Where in the vastness too
I burn through summer nights and ages long,
And with the fiery footed
Watchers shake in myriad dance and song.
Not unremembering we pass
our exile from the starry ways:
One timeless hour in time
we caught from the long night of endless days.
With solemn gaiety the stars
danced far withdrawn on elfin heights:
The lilac breathed amid the
shade of green and blue and citron lights.
ILLUSION
What is the love of shadowy
lips
That know not what they seek
or press,
From whom the lure for ever
slips
And fails their phantom tenderness?
The mystery and light of eyes
That near to mine grow dim
and cold;
They move afar in ancient
skies
Mid flame and mystic darkness
rolled.
O, beauty, as thy heart o’erflows
In tender yielding unto me,
A vast desire awakes and grows
Unto forgetfulness of thee.
The blue dusk ran between
the streets; my love was winged within my mind;
It left to-day and yesterday
and thrice a thousand years behind.
To-day was past and dead for
me for from to-day my feet had run
Through thrice a thousand
years to walk the ways of ancient Babylon.
On temple top and palace roof
the burnished gold flung back the rays
Of a red sunset that was dead
and lost beyond a million days.
The tower of heaven turns
darker blue; a starry sparkle now begins;
The mystery and magnificence,
the myriad beauty and the sins
Come back to me. I walk
beneath the shadowy multitude of towers;
Within the gloom the fountain
jets its pallid mist in lily flowers.
The waters lull me, and the
scent of many gardens, and I hear
Familiar voices, and the voice
I love is whispering in my ear.
Oh real as in dream all this;
and then a hand on mine is laid:
The wave of phantom time withdraws;
and that young Babylonian maid,
One drop of beauty left behind
from all the flowing of that tide,
Is looking with the self-same
eyes, and here in Ireland by my side.
Oh, light our life in Babylon,
but Babylon has taken wings,
While we are in the calm and
proud procession of eternal things.
ALTER EGO
All the morn a spirit gay
Breathes within my heart a
rhyme,
’Tis but hide and seek
we play
In and out the courts of Time.
Fairy lover, when my feet
Through the tangled woodland
go,
’Tis thy sunny fingers
fleet
Fleck the fire dews to and
fro.
In the moonlight grows a smile
Mid its rays of dusty pearl—
’Tis but hide and seek
the while,
As some frolic boy and girl.
When I fade into the deep
Some mysterious radiance showers
From the jewel-heart of sleep
Through the veil of darkened
hours.
Where the ring of twilight
gleams
Round the sanctuary wrought,
Whispers haunt me—in
my dreams
We are one yet know it not.
Some for beauty follow long
Flying traces; some there
be
Seek thee only for a song:
I to lose myself in thee.
‘I am Beauty itself among
beautiful things.’
Bhagavad-Gita
The East was crowned with snow-cold bloom
And hung with veils of pearly fleece:
They died away into the gloom,
Vistas of peace—and deeper peace.
And earth and air and wave and fire
In awe and breathless silence stood;
For One who passed into their choir
Linked them in mystic brotherhood.
Twilight of amethyst, amid
Thy few strange stars that
lit the heights,
Where was the secret spirit
hid?
Where was Thy place, O Light
of Lights?
The flame of Beauty far in
space—
Where rose the fire:
in thee? in me?
Which bowed the elemental
race
To adoration silently?
SYMBOLISM
Now when the spirit in us
wakes and broods,
Filled with home yearnings,
drowsily it flings
From its deep heart high dreams
and mystic moods,
Mixed with the memory of the
loved earth things;
Clothing the vast with a familiar
face;
Reaching its right hand forth
to greet the starry race.
Wondrously near and clear
the great warm fires
Stare from the blue; so shows
the cottage light
To the field labourer whose
heart desires
The old folk by the nook,
the welcome bright
From the house-wife long parted
from at dawn—
So the star villages in God’s
great depths withdrawn.
Nearer to Thee, not by delusion
led,
Though there no house fires
burn nor bright eyes gaze,
We rise, but by the symbol
charioted,
Through loved things rising
up to Love’s own ways
By these the soul unto the
vast has wings
And sets the seal celestial
on all mortal things.
What of all the will to do?
It has vanished long ago,
For a dream-shaft pierced
it through
From the Unknown Archer’s
bow.
What of all the soul to think?
Some one offered it a cup
Filled with a diviner drink,
And the flame has burned it
up.
What of all the hope to climb?
Only in the self we grope
To the misty end of time:
Truth has put an end to hope.
What of all the heart to love?
Sadder than for will or soul,
No light lured it on above;
Love has found itself the
whole.
THE HUNTER
Twilight, a timid fawn, went
glimmering by,
And night, the dark blue hunter,
followed fast:
Ceaseless pursuit and flight
were in the sky,
But the long chase had ceased
for us at last.
We watched together while
the driven fawn
Hid in the golden thicket
of the day:
We from whose hearts pursuit
and flight were gone
Knew on the hunter’s
breast her refuge lay.
The twilight fleeted away
in pearl on the stream,
And night, like a diamond
dome, stood still in our dream.
Your eyes like burnished stones
or as stars were bright
With the sudden vision that
made us one with the night.
We loved in infinite spaces,
forgetting here
The breasts that were lit
with life and the lips so near;
Till the wizard willows waved
in the wind and drew
Me away from the fulness of
love and down to you.
Our love was so vast that
it filled the heavens up:
But the soft white form I
held was an empty cup,
When the willows called me
back to earth with their sigh,
And we moved as shades through
the deep that was you and I.
A CALL OF THE SIDHE
Tarry thou yet, late lingerer
in the twilight’s glory:
Gay are the hills with song:
earth’s faery children leave
More dim abodes to roam the
primrose-hearted eve,
Opening their glimmering lips
to breathe some wondrous story.
Hush, not a whisper!
Let your heart alone go dreaming.
Dream unto dream may pass:
deep in the heart alone
Murmurs the Mighty One his
solemn undertone.
Canst thou not see adown the
silver cloudland streaming
Rivers of faery light, dewdrop
on dewdrop falling,
Starfire of silver flames,
lighting the dark beneath?
And what enraptured hosts
burn on the dusky heath!
Come thou away with them,
for Heaven to Earth is calling.
These are Earth’s voice—her
answer—spirits thronging.
Come to the Land of Youth:
the trees grown heavy there
Drop on the purple wave the
starry fruit they bear.
Drink: the immortal waters
quench the spirit’s longing.
Art thou not now, bright one,
all sorrow past, in elation,
Made young with joy, grown
brother-hearted with the vast,
Whither thy spirit wending
flits the dim stars past
Unto the Light of Lights in
burning adoration.
Image of beauty, when I gaze
on thee,
Trembling I waken to a mystery,
How through one door we go
to life or death
By spirit kindled or the sensual
breath.
Image of beauty, when my way
I go;
No single joy or sorrow do
I know:
Elate for freedom leaps the
starry power,
The life which passes mourns
its wasted hour.
And, ah, to think how thin
the veil that lies
Between the pain of hell and
paradise!
Where the cool grass my aching
head embowers
God sings the lovely carol
of the flowers.
THE GREY EROS
We are desert leagues apart;
Time is misty ages now
Since the warmth of heart
to heart
Chased the shadows from my
brow.
Oh, I am so old, meseems
I am next of kin to Time,
The historian of her dreams
From the long forgotten prime.
You have come a path of flowers.
What a way was mine to roam!
Many a fallen empire’s
towers,
Many a ruined heart my home.
No, there is no comfort, none;
All the dewy tender breath
Idly falls when life is done
On the starless brow of death.
Though the dream of love may
tire,
In the ages long agone
There were ruby hearts of
fire—
Ah, the daughters of the dawn!
Though I am so feeble now,
I remember when our pride
Could not to the Mighty bow;
We would sweep His stars aside.
Mix thy youth with thoughts
like those—
It were but to wither thee,
But to graft the youthful
rose
On the old and flowerless
tree.
Age is no more near than youth
To the sceptre and the crown.
Vain the wisdom, vain the
truth;
Do not lay thy rapture down.
In the wet dusk silver-sweet,
Down the violet scented ways,
As I moved with quiet feet
I was met by mighty days.
On the hedge the hanging dew
Glassed the eve and stars
and skies;
While I gazed a madness grew
Into thundered battle cries.
Where the hawthorn glimmered
white,
Flashed the spear and fell
the stroke—
Ah, what faces pale and bright
Where the dazzling battle
broke!
There a hero-hearted queen
With young beauty lit the
van.
Gone! the darkness flowed
between
All the ancient wars of man.
While I paced the valley’s
gloom
Where the rabbits pattered
near,
Shone a temple and a tomb
With the legend carven clear:
’Time put by a myriad
fates
That her day might dawn in
glory.
Death made wide a million
gates
So to close her tragic story.’
BY THE MARGIN OF THE GREAT DEEP
When the breath of twilight
blows to flame the misty skies,
All its vaporous sapphire,
violet glow, and silver gleam,
With their magic flood me
through the gateway of the eyes;
I am one with the twilight’s
dream.
When the trees and skies and
fields are one in dusky mood,
Every heart of man is wrapt
within the mother’s breast:
Full of peace and sleep and
dreams in the vasty quietude,
I am one with their hearts
at rest.
From our immemorial joys of
hearth and home and love
Strayed away along the margin
of the unknown tide,
All its reach of soundless
calm can thrill me far above
Word or touch from the lips
beside.
Aye, and deep and deep and
deeper let me drink and draw,
From the olden fountain more
than light or peace or dream,
Such primeval being as o’erfills
the heart with awe,
Growing one with its silent
stream.
It was the fairy of the place,
Moving within a little light,
Who touched with dim and shadowy
grace
The conflict at its fever
height.
It seemed to whisper ‘Quietness,’
Then quietly itself was gone:
Yet echoes of its mute caress
Were with me as the years
went on.
It was the warrior within
Who called ’Awake, prepare
for fight:
Yet lose not memory in the
din:
Make of thy gentleness thy
might:
’Make of thy silence
words to shake
The long-enthroned kings of
earth:
Make of thy will the force
to break
Their towers of wantonness
and mirth.’
It was the wise all-seeing
soul
Who counselled neither war
nor peace:
’Only be thou thyself
that goal
In which the wars of time
shall cease.’
DESIRE
With thee a moment! Then
what dreams have play!
Traditions of eternal toil
arise,
Search for the high austere
and lonely way
The Spirit moves in through
eternities.
Ah, in the soul what memories
arise!
And with what yearning inexpressible,
Rising from long forgetfulness
I turn
To Thee, invisible, unrumoured,
still:
White for Thy whiteness all
desires burn.
Ah, with what longing once
again I turn!
‘The soul is its own witness and its own refuge’
Unto the deep the deep heart
goes,
It lays its sadness nigh the
breast:
Only the Mighty Mother knows
The wounds that quiver unconfessed.
It seeks a deeper silence
still;
It folds itself around with
peace,
Where thoughts alike of good
or ill
In quietness unfostered cease.
It feels in the unwounding
vast
For comfort for its hopes
and fears:
The Mighty Mother bows at
last;
She listens to her children’s
tears.
Where the last anguish deepens—there
The fire of beauty smites
through pain:
A glory moves amid despair,
The Mother takes her child
again.
SACRIFICE
Those delicate wanderers,
The wind, the star, the cloud,
Ever before mine eyes,
As to an altar bowed,
Light and dew-laden airs
Offer in sacrifice.
The offerings arise:
Hazes of rainbow light,
Pure crystal, blue, and gold,
Through dreamland take their
flight;
And ’mid the sacrifice
God moveth as of old.
In miracles of fire
He symbols forth his days;
In gleams of crystal light
Reveals what pure pathways
Lead to the soul’s desire,
The silence of the height.
I begin through the grass
once again to be bound to the Lord;
I can see, through a face
that has faded, the face full of rest
Of the Earth, of the Mother,
my heart with her heart in accord:
As I lie mid the cool green
tresses that mantle her breast
I begin with the grass once
again to be bound to the Lord.
By the hand of a child I am
led to the throne of the King,
For a touch that now fevers
me not is forgotten and far,
And His infinite sceptred
hands that sway us can bring
Me in dreams from the laugh
of a child to the song of a star.
On the laugh of a child I
am borne to the joy of the King.
Well, when all is said and
done
Best within my narrow way,
May some angel of the sun
Muse memorial o’er my
clay:
’Here was beauty all
betrayed
From the freedom of her state;
From her human uses stayed
On an idle rhyme to wait.
Ah, what deep despair might
move
If the beauty lit a smile,
Or the heart was warm with
love
That was pondering the while.
He has built his monument
With the winds of time at
strife,
Who could have before he went
Written in the book of life.
To the stars from which he
came
Empty handed he goes home;
He who might have wrought
in flame
Only traced upon the foam.’
THE NUTS OF KNOWLEDGE
’Sinend daughter of Lodan Lucharglan, son of Lir, out of the Land of Promise went to Connlas’ Well which is under the sea, to behold it. That is a well at which are the hazels of wisdom and inspiration that is, the hazels of the science of poetry; and in the same hour their fruit and their blossom & their foliage break forth, and then fall upon the well in the same shower, which raises upon the water a royal surgePage 11
of purple.’
Here Ends
the nuts of knowledge, written
by A.E., Printed,
upon paper
made in Ireland, and published
by Elizabeth
Corbet Yeats
at the Dun Emer press, in
the house of Evelyn
Gleeson at
DUNDRUM in the county of Dublin,
Ireland,
finished on
the tenth day of October,
in the year Nineteen
Hundred & three.