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 Pity of Love
2. The Lamentation of the Old Pensioner
3. The Dedication to a Book of Stories Selected from the Irish Novelists
4. To Ireland in the Coming Times
5. The Ballad of Father Gilligan

Print

1446 Views

Last Poems

To Russian version