“back they rang to sing in Byzantium; / the streets repeat the sound of the Throne”

For Poetry Monday, a late and distinctly Modernist poem by the artist formerly known as the brother of the more famous Jack:


Symbols, William Yeats

A storm beaten old watch-tower,
A blind hermit rings the hour.
All-destroying sword-blade still
Carried by the wandering fool.
Gold-sewn silk on the sword-blade,
Beauty and fool together laid.


---L.

Subject quote from The Vision of the Empire, Charles Williams.