genre: poetry
I'm reading a book right now that has lines from Yeats at the beginning of each chapter so I thought I would give some of his actual poetry a try.
Truth: I both loved it and was confused by it. These poems are lyrical and beautiful, sometimes so much so that it would literally stop my brain in its tracks as I read and I would go over a line three, four, five times. I also needed help when reading because there were a lot of references to places and people that are just unfamiliar to me - having that context really helped Yeats' poetry come alive for me. I liked that there were political ideas, ideas about growing old and maturing, I loved his magical views of the wildlife and world around him.
I'm glad I made the effort - so many lines were familiar to me, some of them lyrics of songs that I know that I had no idea were just poems by Yeats set to music.
Two of my favorite parts:
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild - The Stolen Child
and
Weary and kind one lingered by His seat;
He made the world to be a grassy road
Before her wandering feet - The Rose of the World
okay, one more
When such as I cast our remorse
So great a sweetness flows into the breast
We must laugh and we must sing,
We are blest by everything
Everything we look upon is blest. - A Dialogue of Self and Soul
No comments:
Post a Comment