Responsibilities Part 1

Responsibilities.

by William Butler Yeats.

_Pardon, old fathers, if you still remain_ _Somewhere in ear-shot for the story's end,_ _Old Dublin merchant 'free of ten and four'_ _Or trading out of Galway into Spain;_ _And country scholar, Robert Emmet's friend,_ _A hundred-year-old memory to the poor;_ _Traders or soldiers who have left me blood_ _That has not pa.s.sed through any huxter's loin,_ _Pardon, and you that did not weigh the cost,_ _Old Butlers when you took to horse and stood_ _Beside the brackish waters of the Boyne_ _Till your bad master blenched and all was lost;_ _You merchant skipper that leaped overboard_ _After a ragged hat in Biscay Bay,_ _You most of all, silent and fierce old man_ _Because you were the spectacle that stirred_ _My fancy, and set my boyish lips to say_ _'Only the wasteful virtues earn the sun';_ _Pardon that for a barren pa.s.sion's sake,_ _Although I have come close on forty-nine_ _I have no child, I have nothing but a book,_ _Nothing but that to prove your blood and mine._

_January 1914._

THE GREY ROCK

_Poets with whom I learned my trade,_ _Companions of the Cheshire Cheese,_ _Here's an old story I've re-made,_ _Imagining 'twould better please_ _Your ears than stories now in fashion,_ _Though you may think I waste my breath_ _Pretending that there can be pa.s.sion_ _That has more life in it than death,_ _And though at bottling of your wine_ _The bow-legged Goban had no say;_ _The moral's yours because it's mine._

When cups went round at close of day-- Is not that how good stories run?-- Somewhere within some hollow hill, If books speak truth in Slievenamon, But let that be, the G.o.ds were still And sleepy, having had their meal, And smoky torches made a glare On painted pillars, on a deal Of fiddles and of flutes hung there By the ancient holy hands that brought them From murmuring Murias, on cups-- Old Goban hammered them and wrought them, And put his pattern round their tops To hold the wine they buy of him.

But from the juice that made them wise All those had lifted up the dim Imaginations of their eyes, For one that was like woman made Before their sleepy eyelids ran And trembling with her pa.s.sion said, 'Come out and dig for a dead man, Who's burrowing somewhere in the ground, And mock him to his face and then Hollo him on with horse and hound, For he is the worst of all dead men.'

_We should be dazed and terror struck,_ _If we but saw in dreams that room,_ _Those wine-drenched eyes, and curse our luck_ _That emptied all our days to come._ _I knew a woman none could please,_ _Because she dreamed when but a child_ _Of men and women made like these;_ _And after, when her blood ran wild,_ _Had ravelled her own story out,_ _And said, 'In two or in three years_ _I need must marry some poor lout,'_ _And having said it burst in tears._ _Since, tavern comrades, you have died,_ _Maybe your images have stood,_ _Mere bone and muscle thrown aside,_ _Before that roomful or as good._ _You had to face your ends when young--_ _'Twas wine or women, or some curse--_ _But never made a poorer song_ _That you might have a heavier purse,_ _Nor gave loud service to a cause_ _That you might have a troop of friends._ _You kept the Muses' sterner laws,_ _And unrepenting faced your ends,_ _And therefore earned the right--and yet_ _Dowson and Johnson most I praise--_ _To troop with those the world's forgot,_ _And copy their proud steady gaze._

'The Danish troop was driven out Between the dawn and dusk,' she said; 'Although the event was long in doubt, Although the King of Ireland's dead And half the kings, before sundown All was accomplished.'

'When this day Murrough, the King of Ireland's son, Foot after foot was giving way, He and his best troops back to back Had perished there, but the Danes ran, Stricken with panic from the attack, The shouting of an unseen man; And being thankful Murrough found, Led by a footsole dipped in blood That had made prints upon the ground, Where by old thorn trees that man stood; And though when he gazed here and there, He had but gazed on thorn trees, spoke, "Who is the friend that seems but air And yet could give so fine a stroke?"

Thereon a young man met his eye, Who said, "Because she held me in Her love, and would not have me die, Rock-nurtured Aoife took a pin, And pushing it into my shirt, Promised that for a pin's sake, No man should see to do me hurt; But there it's gone; I will not take The fortune that had been my shame Seeing, King's son, what wounds you have."

'Twas roundly spoke, but when night came He had betrayed me to his grave, For he and the King's son were dead.

I'd promised him two hundred years, And when for all I'd done or said-- And these immortal eyes shed tears-- He claimed his country's need was most, I'd save his life, yet for the sake Of a new friend he has turned a ghost.

What does he care if my heart break?

I call for spade and horse and hound That we may harry him.' Thereon She cast herself upon the ground And rent her clothes and made her moan: 'Why are they faithless when their might Is from the holy shades that rove The grey rock and the windy light?

Why should the faithfullest heart most love The bitter sweetness of false faces?

Why must the lasting love what pa.s.ses, Why are the G.o.ds by men betrayed!'

But thereon every G.o.d stood up With a slow smile and without sound, And stretching forth his arm and cup To where she moaned upon the ground, Suddenly drenched her to the skin; And she with Goban's wine adrip, No more remembering what had been, Stared at the G.o.ds with laughing lip.

_I have kept my faith, though faith was tried,_ _To that rock-born, rock-wandering foot,_ _And the world's altered since you died,_ _And I am in no good repute_ _With the loud host before the sea,_ _That think sword strokes were better meant_ _Than lover's music--let that be,_ _So that the wandering foot's content._

THE TWO KINGS

King Eochaid came at sundown to a wood Westward of Tara. Hurrying to his queen He had out-ridden his war-wasted men That with empounded cattle trod the mire; And where beech trees had mixed a pale green light With the ground-ivy's blue, he saw a stag Whiter than curds, its eyes the tint of the sea.

Because it stood upon his path and seemed More hands in height than any stag in the world He sat with tightened rein and loosened mouth Upon his trembling horse, then drove the spur; But the stag stooped and ran at him, and pa.s.sed, Rending the horse's flank. King Eochaid reeled Then drew his sword to hold its levelled point Against the stag. When horn and steel were met The horn resounded as though it had been silver, A sweet, miraculous, terrifying sound.

Horn locked in sword, they tugged and struggled there As though a stag and unicorn were met In Africa on Mountain of the Moon, Until at last the double horns, drawn backward, b.u.t.ted below the single and so pierced The entrails of the horse. Dropping his sword King Eochaid seized the horns in his strong hands And stared into the sea-green eye, and so Hither and thither to and fro they trod Till all the place was beaten into mire.

The strong thigh and the agile thigh were met, The hands that gathered up the might of the world, And hoof and horn that had sucked in their speed Amid the elaborate wilderness of the air.

Through bush they plunged and over ivied root, And where the stone struck fire, while in the leaves A squirrel whinnied and a bird screamed out; But when at last he forced those sinewy flanks Against a beech bole, he threw down the beast And knelt above it with drawn knife. On the instant It vanished like a shadow, and a cry So mournful that it seemed the cry of one Who had lost some unimaginable treasure Wandered between the blue and the green leaf And climbed into the air, crumbling away, Till all had seemed a shadow or a vision But for the trodden mire, the pool of blood, The disembowelled horse.

King Eochaid ran, Toward peopled Tara, nor stood to draw his breath Until he came before the painted wall, The posts of polished yew, circled with bronze, Of the great door; but though the hanging lamps Showed their faint light through the unshuttered windows, Nor door, nor mouth, nor slipper made a noise, Nor on the ancient beaten paths, that wound From well-side or from plough-land, was there noise; And there had been no sound of living thing Before him or behind, but that far-off On the horizon edge bellowed the herds.

Knowing that silence brings no good to kings, And mocks returning victory, he pa.s.sed Between the pillars with a beating heart And saw where in the midst of the great hall Pale-faced, alone upon a bench, Edain Sat upright with a sword before her feet.

Her hands on either side had gripped the bench, Her eyes were cold and steady, her lips tight.

Some pa.s.sion had made her stone. Hearing a foot She started and then knew whose foot it was; But when he thought to take her in his arms She motioned him afar, and rose and spoke: 'I have sent among the fields or to the woods The fighting men and servants of this house, For I would have your judgment upon one Who is self-accused. If she be innocent She would not look in any known man's face Till judgment has been given, and if guilty, Will never look again on known man's face.'

And at these words he paled, as she had paled, Knowing that he should find upon her lips The meaning of that monstrous day.

Then she: 'You brought me where your brother Ardan sat Always in his one seat, and bid me care him Through that strange illness that had fixed him there, And should he die to heap his burial mound And carve his name in Ogham.' Eochaid said, 'He lives?' 'He lives and is a healthy man.'

'While I have him and you it matters little What man you have lost, what evil you have found.'

'I bid them make his bed under this roof And carried him his food with my own hands, And so the weeks pa.s.sed by. But when I said "What is this trouble?" he would answer nothing, Though always at my words his trouble grew; And I but asked the more, till he cried out, Weary of many questions: "There are things That make the heart akin to the dumb stone."

Then I replied: "Although you hide a secret, Hopeless and dear, or terrible to think on, Speak it, that I may send through the wide world For medicine." Thereon he cried aloud: "Day after day you question me, and I, Because there is such a storm amid my thoughts I shall be carried in the gust, command, Forbid, beseech and waste my breath." Then I, "Although the thing that you have hid were evil, The speaking of it could be no great wrong, And evil must it be, if done 'twere worse Than mound and stone that keep all virtue in, And loosen on us dreams that waste our life, Shadows and shows that can but turn the brain."

But finding him still silent I stooped down And whispering that none but he should hear, Said: "If a woman has put this on you, My men, whether it please her or displease, And though they have to cross the Loughlan waters And take her in the middle of armed men, Shall make her look upon her handiwork, That she may quench the rick she has fired; and though She may have worn silk clothes, or worn a crown, She'll not be proud, knowing within her heart That our sufficient portion of the world Is that we give, although it be brief giving, Happiness to children and to men."

Then he, driven by his thought beyond his thought, And speaking what he would not though he would, Sighed: "You, even you yourself, could work the cure!"

And at those words I rose and I went out And for nine days he had food from other hands, And for nine days my mind went whirling round The one disastrous zodiac, muttering That the immedicable mound's beyond Our questioning, beyond our pity even.

But when nine days had gone I stood again Before his chair and bending down my head Told him, that when Orion rose, and all The women of his household were asleep, To go--for hope would give his limbs the power-- To an old empty woodman's house that's hidden Close to a clump of beech trees in the wood Westward of Tara, there to await a friend That could, as he had told her, work his cure And would be no harsh friend.

When night had deepened, I groped my way through boughs, and over roots, Till oak and hazel ceased and beech began, And found the house, a sputtering torch within, And stretched out sleeping on a pile of skins Ardan, and though I called to him and tried To shake him out of sleep, I could not rouse him.

I waited till the night was on the turn, Then fearing that some labourer, on his way To plough or pasture-land, might see me there, Went out.

Among the ivy-covered rocks, As on the blue light of a sword, a man Who had unnatural majesty, and eyes Like the eyes of some great kite scouring the woods, Stood on my path. Trembling from head to foot I gazed at him like grouse upon a kite; But with a voice that had unnatural music, "A weary wooing and a long," he said, "Speaking of love through other lips and looking Under the eyelids of another, for it was my craft That put a pa.s.sion in the sleeper there, And when I had got my will and drawn you here, Where I may speak to you alone, my craft Sucked up the pa.s.sion out of him again And left mere sleep. He'll wake when the sun wakes, Push out his vigorous limbs and rub his eyes, And wonder what has ailed him these twelve months."

I cowered back upon the wall in terror, But that sweet-sounding voice ran on: "Woman, I was your husband when you rode the air, Danced in the whirling foam and in the dust, In days you have not kept in memory, Being betrayed into a cradle, and I come That I may claim you as my wife again."

I was no longer terrified, his voice Had half awakened some old memory, Yet answered him: "I am King Eochaid's wife And with him have found every happiness Women can find." With a most masterful voice, That made the body seem as it were a string Under a bow, he cried: "What happiness Can lovers have that know their happiness Must end at the dumb stone? But where we build Our sudden palaces in the still air Pleasure itself can bring no weariness, Nor can time waste the cheek, nor is there foot That has grown weary of the whirling dance, Nor an unlaughing mouth, but mine that mourns, Among those mouths that sing their sweethearts' praise, Your empty bed." "How should I love," I answered, "Were it not that when the dawn has lit my bed And shown my husband sleeping there, I have sighed, 'Your strength and n.o.bleness will pa.s.s away.'

Or how should love be worth its pains were it not That when he has fallen asleep within my arms, Being wearied out, I love in man the child?

What can they know of love that do not know She builds her nest upon a narrow ledge Above a windy precipice?" Then he: "Seeing that when you come to the death-bed You must return, whether you would or no, This human life blotted from memory, Why must I live some thirty, forty years, Alone with all this useless happiness?"

Thereon he seized me in his arms, but I Thrust him away with both my hands and cried, "Never will I believe there is any change Can blot out of my memory this life Sweetened by death, but if I could believe That were a double hunger in my lips For what is doubly brief."

And now the shape, My hands were pressed to, vanished suddenly.

I staggered, but a beech tree stayed my fall, And clinging to it I could hear the c.o.c.ks Crow upon Tara.'

King Eochaid bowed his head And thanked her for her kindness to his brother, For that she promised, and for that refused.

Thereon the bellowing of the empounded herds Rose round the walls, and through the bronze-ringed door Jostled and shouted those war-wasted men, And in the midst King Eochaid's brother stood.

He'd heard that din on the horizon's edge And ridden towards it, being ignorant.

TO A WEALTHY MAN WHO PROMISED A SECOND SUBSCRIPTION TO THE DUBLIN MUNIc.i.p.aL GALLERY IF IT WERE PROVED THE PEOPLE WANTED PICTURES

You gave but will not give again Until enough of Paudeen's pence By Biddy's halfpennies have lain To be 'some sort of evidence,'

Before you'll put your guineas down, That things it were a pride to give Are what the blind and ignorant town Imagines best to make it thrive.

What cared Duke Ercole, that bid His mummers to the market place, What th' onion-sellers thought or did So that his Plautus set the pace For the Italian comedies?

And Guidobaldo, when he made That grammar school of courtesies Where wit and beauty learned their trade Upon Urbino's windy hill, Had sent no runners to and fro That he might learn the shepherds' will.

And when they drove out Cosimo, Indifferent how the rancour ran, He gave the hours they had set free To Michelozzo's latest plan For the San Marco Library, Whence turbulent Italy should draw Delight in Art whose end is peace, In logic and in natural law By sucking at the dugs of Greece.

Your open hand but shows our loss, For he knew better how to live.

Let Paudeens play at pitch and toss, Look up in the sun's eye and give What the exultant heart calls good That some new day may breed the best Because you gave, not what they would But the right twigs for an eagle's nest!