Yeats and Gonne

Well, continuing with my recent quazi-infatuation with poetry, here is another favorite I would like to share. "When You Are Old" written by W.B. Yeats, is about the unrequited love for Maud Gonne, a fiery Irish freedom-fighter revolutionary, who kept him wrapped around her little finger until his dying day. He proposed dozens upon dozen times (always dealt a cold hearted no). Yet, for some reason he was too attached to move on. The man, by no means, lacked persistence and felt no shame with rejection. I suspect that probably at the lowest point of his self-worth he thought it would be a good idea to have a go with the next generation of Gonnes' and proposed to Maud's first daughter (Breaking Dawn, anyone?) Iseult, who Maude had with a French Journalist years earlier, said no.

Shocker...

Anyways, Yeats did eventually marry. A woman named George Hyde-Lees (who he referred to as Georgie) who although became his first wife did not replace his static muse, Maud. With her husband still in love with Maud, Georgie started to do--a somewhat creepy, somewhat eastern mystical-esc voodoo, somewhat wigi board inspired--practice to recapture (or maybe even capture for the first time) her hubby's attention, called Automatic Writing. Click here for more info on automatic writing.

As a Yeats' fan and reading "When You are Old", I can't help but to think of Maud as a heartless beezy. The fiery woman did get married eventually. Not to Yeats but to the drunken lout, Macbride, another pivotal Irish revolutionary (who was actually English), who abused her for the duration of their marriage. By the time he was executed at the Kilimanjaro Gaol for the Easter 1916 rebellion, they had been estranged for quite some time. I find it amazing that a woman can be both one of Ireland's most influential revolutionaries, help lead an independence against one of the World's top super powers, making bombs, holding underground meetings and charging revolts (whatever else it takes to cause a revolution) and also still be an absolute idiot when it came to men....

Who knows why Yeats and Gonne never hit it off... Maybe Yeats had some personality defect, maybe he had a temper, maybe he had syphilis... But, regardless of my dislike of Maud at the defense of Yates, I can't help, but also thank her, because she helped produce some of the most beautiful love poems of the early 20th century...

So indulge in your own broken heart.

"When You are Old"

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

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;

And bending down beside the glowing bars,
Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.