An Irish Memory

In the spare words of poetry, I find simple elegance and peace.

 

Poetry helps to bring me back to my center.  To take a deep breath.  To slow down and find my direction.

If you are not familiar with William Butler Yeats, he was a distinguished Irish poet who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1923, the first Irishman so honored, and later, with others, went on to found the world famous Abbey Theatre located in Dublin.

 

Yeats' The Lake of Innisfree is musical in its words and when I close my eyes, I imagine I am in Killarney, Ireland about 24 years ago when my husband was alive.  A local man who owned a boat offered to take us out on the lake near the Muckross House and he is slowly rowing us and as we gently glide through the water of the lake, it's quiet and beautiful and the wind is blowing.

 

The Emerald Isle

 

The Lake Isle of Innisfree
By William Butler Yeats 1865–1939

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,

And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;

Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee,

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,

Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;

There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,

And evening full of the linnet’s wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day

I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;

While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,

I hear it in the deep heart’s core.