Project Gutenberg's The Green Helmet and Other Poems, by William Butler Yeats

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: The Green Helmet and Other Poems

Author: William Butler Yeats

Release Date: November 17, 2009 [EBook #30488]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREEN HELMET AND OTHER POEMS ***

Produced by Meredith Bach, Marius Borror and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)

THE GREEN HELMET AND
OTHER POEMS

THE GREEN HELMET AND
OTHER POEMS

BY

WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS

NEW YORK
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LTD.
1912

_All rights reserved_

Copyright, 1911, by
WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS

Copyright, 1912, by
THE MACMILLAN CO.

_Set up and electrotyped. Published October, 1912_

THE GREEN HELMET AND
OTHER POEMS

HIS DREAM

I swayed upon the gaudy stern
The butt end of a steering oar,
And everywhere that I could turn
Men ran upon the shore.

And though I would have hushed the crowd
There was no mother's son but said,
"What is the figure in a shroud
Upon a gaudy bed?"

And fishes bubbling to the brim
Cried out upon that thing beneath,
It had such dignity of limb,
By the sweet name of Death.

Though I'd my finger on my lip,
What could I but take up the song?
And fish and crowd and gaudy ship
Cried out the whole night long,

Crying amid the glittering sea,
Naming it with ecstatic breath,
Because it had such dignity
By the sweet name of Death.

A WOMAN HOMER SUNG

If any man drew near
When I was young,
I thought, "He holds her dear,"
And shook with hate and fear.
But oh, 'twas bitter wrong
If he could pass her by
With an indifferent eye.

Whereon I wrote and wrought,
And now, being gray,
I dream that I have brought
To such a pitch my thought
That coming time can say,
"He shadowed in a glass
What thing her body was."