“When You Are Old"WHEN you are old and grey 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.”

“When you are old and grey 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.”

“We sat grown quiet at the name of love; We saw the last embers of daylight die,And in the trembling blue-green of the skyA moon, worn as if it had been a shellWashed by time's waters as they rose and fellAbout the stars and broke in days and years.I had a thought for no one's but your ears:That you were beautiful, and that I stroveTo love you in the old high way of love;That it had all seemed happy, and yet we'd grownAs weary-hearted as that hollow moon”

“. Sometimes, but only for a moment, I saw a faint solitaryfigure with a Rosa veiled face, and carrying a faint torch, flit among the dancers, but like a dream within adream, like a shadow of a shadow, and I knew by an understanding born from a deeper fountain than thought,that it was Eros himself, and that his face was veiled because no man or woman from the beginning of theworld has ever known what love is, or looked into his eyes, for Eros alone of divinities is altogether a spirit,and hides in passions not of his essence if he would commune with a mortal heart. So that if a man love noblyhe knows love through infinite pity, unspeakable trust, unending sympathy; and if ignobly through vehementjealousy, sudden hatred, and unappeasable desire; but unveiled love he never knows.”

“Never shall a young man,Thrown into despairBy those great honey-colouredRamparts at your ear,Love you for yourself aloneAnd not your yellow hair.”

“Then the woman in the bed sat up and looked about her with wild eyes; and the oldest of the old men said: 'Lady, we have come to write down the names of the immortals,’ and at his words a look of great joy came into her face. Presently she, began to speak slowly, and yet eagerly, as though she knew she had but a little while to live, and, in English, with the accent of their own country; and she told them the secret names of the immortals of many lands, and of the colours, and odours, and weapons, and instruments of music and instruments of handicraft they held dearest; but most about the immortals of Ireland and of their love for the cauldron, and the whetstone, and the sword, and the spear, and the hills of the Shee, and the horns of the moon, and the Grey Wind, and the Yellow Wind, and the Black Wind, and the Red Wind. ("The Adoration of the Magi")”