HE WISHES HIS BELOVED WERE DEAD
by: William Butler Yeats
(1865-1939)
- ERE you but lying cold and dead,
- And lights were paling out of the West,
- You would come hither, and bend your head,
- And I would lay my head on your breast;
- And you would murmur tender words,
- Forgiving me, because you were dead:
- Nor would you rise and hasten away,
- Though you have the will of wild birds,
- But know your hair was bound and wound
- About the stars and moon and sun:
- O would, beloved, that you lay
- Under the dock-leaves in the ground,
- While lights were paling one by one.
"He Wishes His Beloved Were
Dead" is reprinted from The Wind Among the Reeds.
W.B. Yeats. London: Elkin Mathews, 1899. |
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