The Rose Tree

"O words are lightly spoken,"
Said Pearse to Connolly,
"Maybe a breath of politic words
Has withered our Rose Tree;
Or maybe but a wind that blows
Across the bitter sea."
"It needs to be but watered,"
James Connolly replied,
"To make the green come out again
And spread on every side,
And shake the blossom from the bud
To be the garden's pride."
"But where can we draw water,"
Said Pearse to Connolly,
"When all the wells are parched away?
O plain as plain can be
There's nothing but our own red blood
Can make a right Rose Tree."

William Butler Yeats

William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet, dramatist, prose writer, and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years he served as an Irish Senator for two terms. Yeats was a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival and was co-founder of the Abbey Theatre. In 1923, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.

William Butler Yeats

The Mountain Tomb

William Butler Yeats, Simple Poetry

Sweet Dancer

William Butler Yeats, Simple Poetry

Crazy Jane Reproved

William Butler Yeats, Simple Poetry

A Last Confession

William Butler Yeats, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Aedh Tells Of The Rose In His Heart

All things uncomely and broken, all things worn out and old,
The cry of a child by the roadway, the creak of a lumbering cart,
The heavy steps of the ploughman, splashing the wintry mould,
Are wronging your image that blossoms a rose in the deeps of my heart.

The wrong of unshapely things is a wrong too great to be told;
I hunger to build them anew and sit on a green knoll apart,
With the earth and the sky and the water, remade, like a casket of gold
For my dreams of your image that blossoms a rose in the deeps of my heart.

William Butler Yeats

To The Rose Upon The Road Of Time

i(Red Rose, proud Rose, sad Rose of all my days!)
i(Come near me, while I sing the ancient ways:)
i(Cuchulain battling with the bitter tide;)
i(The Druid, grey, wood-nurtured, quiet-eyed,)
i(Who cast round Fergus dreams, and ruin untold;)
i(And thine own sadness, where of stars, grown old)
i(In dancing silver-sandaled on the sea,)
i(Sing in their high and lonely melody.)
i(Come near, that no more blinded hy man's fate,)
i(I find under the boughs of love and hate,)
i(In all poor foolish things that live a day,)
i(Eternal beauty wandering on her way.)
i(Come near, come near, come near -- Ah, leave me still)
i(A little space for the rose-breath to fill!)
i(Lest I no more bear common things that crave;)
i(The weak worm hiding down in its small cave,)
i(The field-m...

William Butler Yeats

The Lover Tells Of The Rose In His Heart

All things uncomely and broken, all things worn out
and old,
The cry of a child by the roadway, the creak of a lum-
bering cart,
The heavy steps of the ploughman, splashing the
wintry mould,
Are wronging your image that blossoms a rose in the
deeps of my heart.
The wrong of unshapely things is a wrong too great
to be told;
I hunger to build them anew and sit on a green knoll
apart,
With the earth and the sky and the water, re-made, like
a casket of gold
For my dreams of your image that blossoms a rose in
the deeps of my heart.

William Butler Yeats

The Rose Of Battle

Rose of all Roses, Rose of all the World!
The tall thought-woven sails, that flap unfurled
Above the tide of hours, trouble the air,
And God's bell buoyed to be the water's care;
While hushed from fear, or loud with hope, a band
With blown, spray-dabbled hair gather at hand,
i(Turn if you may from battles never done,)
I call, as they go by me one by one,
i(Danger no refuge holds, and war no peace,)
i(For him who hears love sing and never cease,)
i(Beside her clean-swept hearth, her quiet shade:)
i(But gather all for whom no love hath made)
i(A woven silence, or but came to cast)
i(A song into the air, and singing passed)
i(To smile on the pale dawn; and gather you)
i(Who have sought more than is in rain or dew,)
i(Or in the sun and moon, or on the earth,)

William Butler Yeats

William O'Kelly

    The Protecting Tree
        Of the men of the land of Fál!
    What aileth thee,
        And why is it that all
    About thee grieves?

    Alas, O Tree of the Leaves!
        Here is thy rhyme:
    Thy bloom is lightened;
    And if thy fruit be withered
    Thy root hath not tightened
        At the same time.

    Not since the Gael was sold
    At Aughrim.    Not since to cold,
    Dull death went Owen Roe;
    Not since the drowning of Clann Adam in the days of Noe
        Brought men to hush,
    Has such a tale of woe come to us
        In such a rush.

    The true flower of the blood of the place is fallen:
    The true clean-wheat of the Gael is reaped.

    Destruction be upon Death,
        For he h...

James Stephens

The Secret Rose

Far off, most secret, and inviolate Rose,
Enfold me in my hour of hours; where those
Who sought thee in the Holy Sepulchre,
Or in the wine vat, dwell beyond the stir
And tumult of defeated dreams; and deep
Among pale eyelids, heavy with the sleep
Men have named beauty. Thy great leaves enfold
The ancient beards, the helms of ruby and gold
Of the crowned Magi; and the king whose eyes
Saw the Pierced Hands and Rood of elder rise
In druid vapour and make the torches dim;
Till vain frenzy awoke and he died; and him
Who met Fand walking among flaming dew
By a gray shore where the wind never blew,
And lost the world and Emer for a kiss;
And him who drove the gods out of their liss,
And till a hundred morns had flowered red,
Feasted and wept the barrows of his d...

William Butler Yeats