I realize I share a lot of poems about love. I know. But let’s be honest, a lot of poetry is written about love and many of our most beloved poems are about the subject. And why not? It’s the cause of most of our joy and most of our pain. Of course we try to make sense of it with verse. So I’m recognizing how many love poems are on this blog and owning it. And adding another one.
On a sidenote, I can’t believe I haven’t shared an Irish poet until today, partially because Ireland is known as a land of poets and partially because I absolutely love Ireland and its poets. I find it funny (coincidental? not coincidental?) that the two places I feel most connected to after the U.S. – Ireland and Chile – are both known for their poets. I should really have added more them this month, and I’ll try to do so going forward because there are so many good poems to share. The struggle!
But I digress. Today’s poem is, yet again, one I first read in Americans’ Favorite Poems. My favorite part? The line about her “pilgrim soul.” I melt.
When You Are Old
By William Butler Yeats
When you are old and gray and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;
How many loved your moments of glad grace,
And loved your beauty with love false or true;
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face.
And bending down beside the glowing bars
Murmur, a little sadly, how love fled
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.
A Semi Nomadic Kind of Life 