Though logic choppers rule the town,
And every man and maid and boy
Has marked a distant object down,
An aimless joy is a pure joy,
Or so did Tom ORoughley say
That saw the surges running by,
And wisdom is a butterfly
And not a gloomy bird of prey.
If little planned is little sinned
But little need the grave distress.
Whats dying but a second wind?
How but in zigzag wantonness
Could trumpeter Michael be so brave?
Or something of that sort he said,
And if my dearest friend were dead
Id dance a measure on his grave.
Tom ORoughley
William Butler Yeats
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