Poem by William Butler Yeats

The Old Men Admiring Themselves in the Water

I HEARD the old, old men say,
"Everything alters,
And one by one we drop away."
They had hands like claws, and their knees
Were twisted like the old thorn-trees
By the waters.
I heard the old, old men say,
"All that's beautiful drifts away
Like the waters."

1. The Rose of Battle
2. The Lover Tells of the Rose in His Heart
3. The Rose of the World
4. The Ballad of Father Gilligan
5. For Anne Gregory

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