I am still of opinion that only two topics can be of the least interest to a serious and studious mood – sex and the dead.
To be born woman is to know – although they do not speak of it at school – women must labor to be beautiful.
I think it better that in times like these a poet’s mouth be silent, for in truth we have no gift to set a statesman right.
Nor dread nor hope attend a dying animal; a man awaits his end dreading and hoping all.
The blessed spirits must be sought within the self which is common to all.
I think all happiness depends on the energy to assume the mask of some other life, on a re-birth as something not one’s self.
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.
God guard me from those thoughts men think In the mind alone.
Is it not certain that the Creator yawns in earthquake and thunder and other popular displays, but toils in rounding the delicate spiral of a shell? -Yeats, The Trembling of the Veil.
Ecstasy is from the contemplation of things vaster than the individual and imperfectly seen perhaps, by all those that still live.
All the wild-witches, those most notable ladies For all their broom-sticks and their tears, Their angry tears, are gone.
If I make the lashes dark And the eyes more bright And the lips more scarlet, Or ask if all be right From mirror after mirror, No vanity’s displayed: I’m looking for the face I had Before the world was made.
I bring you with reverent hands The books of my numberless dreams.
The mystical life is at the centre of all that I do and all that I think and all that I write.
I went out to the hazelwood because a fire was in my head.
Everything exists, everything is true and the earth is just a bit of dust beneath our feet.
My wretched dragon is perplexed.
All the great masters have understood that there cannot be great art without the little limited life of the fable, which is always better the simpler it is, and the rich, far-wandering, many-imaged life of the half-seen world beyond it.
Oh, Love is the crooked thing, there is nobody wise enough to find out all that is in it, for he will be thinking about love til the stars run away and the shadows eaten the moon...
I call on those that call me son, Grandson, or great-grandson, On uncles, aunts, great-uncles or great-aunts, To judge what I have done. Have I, that put it into words, Spoilt what old loins have sent?