Life and Existence

That is no country for old men. The young In one another’s arms, birds in the trees —Those dying generations—at their song, The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas, Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long Whatever is begotten, born, and dies. Caught in that sensual music all neglect Monuments of unaging intellect.

That is no country for old men. The young In one another’s arms, birds in the trees —Those dying generations—at their song, The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas, Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long Whatever is begotten, born, and dies. Caught in that sensual music all neglect Monuments of unaging intellect.

The soul recovers radical innocence And learns at last that it is self-delighting, Self-appeasing, self-affrighting, And that its own sweet will is Heaven’s will.

The soul recovers radical innocence And learns at last that it is self-delighting, Self-appeasing, self-affrighting, And that its own sweet will is Heaven’s will.

That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

All changed, changed utterly: A terrible beauty is born.

All changed, changed utterly: A terrible beauty is born.

I knew a phoenix in my youth, so let them have their day.

What made us dream that he could comb gray hair?

Of that late death took all my heart for speech.

Unwearied still, lover by lover, They paddle in the cold Companionable streams or climb the air; Their hearts have not grown old.

We make out of the quarrel with others, rhetoric, but of the quarrel with ourselves, poetry.

The uncontrollable mystery on the bestial floor.

Be secret and exult, Because of all things known That is most difficult.

In dreams begins responsibility. 4

Wine comes in at the mouth And love comes in at the eye; That’s all we shall know for truth Before we grow old and die.

Though leaves are many, the root is one; Through all the lying days of my youth I swayed my leaves and flowers in the sun; Now I may wither into the truth.

The friends that have it I do wrong When ever I remake a song Should know what issue is at stake, It is myself that I remake.

The friends that have it I do wrong When ever I remake a song Should know what issue is at stake, It is myself that I remake.

And God stands winding His lonely horn, And time and the world are ever in flight.

Where nobody gets old and godly and grave, Where nobody gets old and crafty and wise, Where nobody gets old and bitter of tongue.

How many loved your moments of glad grace, And loved your beauty with love false or true, But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you, And loved the sorrows of your changing face.

When you are old and gray and full of sleep, And nodding by the fire, take down this book. 3

The years like great black oxen tread the world, And God the herdsman goads them on behind, And I am broken by their passing feet.