Poem by William Butler Yeats

A Prayer for Old Age

God guard me from those thoughts men think
In the mind alone;
He that sings a lasting song
Thinks in a marrow-bone;

From all that makes a wise old man
That can be praised of all;
O what am I that I should not seem
For the song's sake a fool?

I pray -- for word is out
And prayer comes round again --
That I may seem, though I die old,
A foolish, passionate man. 

1. The Dedication to a Book of Stories Selected from the Irish Novelists
2. To Ireland in the Coming Times
3. The Lamentation of the Old Pensioner
4. The Pity of Love
5. The Old Men Admiring Themselves in the Water

Madison Cawein A Prayer for Old Age ("These are the things which I would ask of Time")

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