by W. B. Yeats
FIRST SAILOR [falling into a dream]. It is what they are saying, there is some person dead in the other ship; we have to go and wake him. They did not say what way he came to his end, but it was sudden.
SECOND SAILOR. YOU are right, you are right. We have to go to that wake.
DECTORA. He has flung a Druid spell upon the air,
And set you dreaming.
SECOND SAILOR. What way can we raise a keen, not knowing what name to call him by?
FIRST SAILOR. Come on to his ship. His name will come to mind in a moment. All
I know is he died a thousand years ago, and was never yet waked.
SECOND SAILOR. HOW can we wake him having no ale?
FIRST SAILOR. I saw a skin of ale aboard her — a pig-skin of brown ale.
THIRD SAILOR. Come to the ale, a pigskin of brown ale, a goatskin of yellow!
FIRST SAILOR [singing]. Brown ale and yellow; yellow and brown ale; a goatskin of yellow!
ALL [singing]. Brown ale and yellow; yellow and brown ale!
[SAILORS go out,
DECTORA. Protect me now, gods, that my people swear by!
[AIBRIC has risen from the ground where he had fallen. He has begun looking for his sword as if in a dream.
AIBRIC. Where is my sword that fell out of my hand
When I first heard the news? Ah, there it is!
[He goes dreamily towards the sword, but DECTORA runs at it and takes it up before he can reach it.
[Sleepily.] Queen, give it me.
DECTORA. — No, I have need of it.
AIBRIC. Why do you need a sword? But you may keep it,
Now that he’s dead I have no need of it,
For everything is gone.
A SAILOR [calling from the other ship].
Come hither, Aibric,
And tell me who it is that we are waking.
AIBRIC [half to DECTORA, half to himself].
What name had that dead king? Arthur of Britain?
No, no — not Arthur. I remember now.
It was golden-armed Iollan, and he died
Brokenhearted, having lost his queen
Through wicked spells. That is not all the tale,
For he was killed. 0!0!0!0!0!0!
For golden-armed Iollan has been killed.
[He goes out. While he has been speaking, and through part of what follows, one hears the singing of the sailors from the other ship, DECTORA stands with the sword lifted in front of FORGAEL. He changes the tune.
DECTORA. I will end all your magic on the instant.
[Her voice becomes dreamy, and she lowers the sword slowly, and finally lets it fall She spreads out her hair.
She takes off her crown and lays it upon the deck.
The sword is to lie beside him in the grave.
It was in all his battles. I will spread my hair,
And wring my hands, and wail him bitterly,
For I have heard that he was proud and laughing,
Blue-eyed, and a quick runner on bare feet,
And that he died a thousand years ago.
O! O! O!
[FORGAEL changes the tune.]
But no, that is not it.
I knew him well, and while I heard him laughing
They killed him at my feet. O! O! O! O!
For golden-armed Iollan that I loved.
But what is it that made me say I loved him?
It was that harper put it in my thoughts,
But it is true. Why did they run upon him,
And beat the golden helmet with their swords?
FORGAEL. Do you not know me, lady? I am he
That you are weeping for.
DECTORA. — No, for he is dead.
O! O! O! for golden-armed Iollan.
FORGAEL. It was so given out, but I will prove
That the grave-diggers in a dreamy frenzy
Have buried nothing but my golden arms.
Listen to that low-laughing string of the moon
And you will recollect my face and voice.
For you have listened to me playing it
These thousand years.
[He starts up, listening to the birds.
The harp slips from his hands, and remains leaning against the bulwarks behind him.
What are the birds at there?
Why are they all a-flutter of a sudden?
What are you calling out above the mast?
If railing and reproach and mockery
Because I have awakened her to love
By magic strings, I’ll make this answer to it:
Being driven on by voices and by dreams
That were clear messages from the Everliving,
I have done right. What could I but obey?
And yet you make a clamour of reproach.
DECTORA [laughing]. Why, it’s a wonder out of reckoning
That I should keen him from the full of the moon
To the horn, and he be hale and hearty.
FORGAEL. How have I wronged her now that she is merry?
But no, no, no! your cry is not against me.
You know the councils of the Ever-living,
And all the tossing of your wings is joy,
And all that murmuring’s but a marriage song;
But if it be reproach, I answer this:
There is not one among you that made love
By any other means. You call it passion,
Consideration, generosity;
But it was all deceit, and flattery
To win a woman in her own despite,
For love is war, and there is hatred in it;
And if you say that she came willingly —
DECTORA. Why do you turn away and hide your face,
That I would look upon for ever?
FORGAEL. — My grief.
DECTORA. Have I not loved you for a thousand years?
FORGAEL. I never have been golden-armed Iollan.
DECTORA. I do not understand. I know your face
Better than my own hands.
FORGAEL. — I have deceived you
Out of all reckoning.
DECTORA. — Is it not true
That you were born a thousand years ago,
In islands where the children of Aengus wind
In happy dances under a windy moon,
And that you’ll bring me there?
FORGAEL. — I have deceived you;
I have deceived you utterly.
DECTORA. — How can that be?
Is it that though your eyes are full of love
Some other woman has a claim on you,
And I’ve but half?
FORGAEL. — Oh, no!
DECTORA. — And if there is,
If there be half a hundred more, what matter?
I’ll never give another thought to it;
No, no, nor half a thought; but do not speak.
Women are hard and proud and stubbornhearted,
Their heads being turned with praise and flattery;
And that is why their lovers are afraid
To tell them a plain story.
FORGAEL. — That’s not the story;
But I have done so great a wrong against you,
There is no measure that it would not burst.
I will confess it all.
DECTORA. — What do I care,
Now that my body has begun to dream,
And you have grown to be a burning coal
In the imagination and intellect?
If something that’s most fabulous were true —
If you had taken me by magic spells,
And killed a lover or husband at my feet —
I would not let you speak, for I would know
That it was yesterday and not to-day
I loved him; I would cover up my ears,
As I am doing now. [A pause.] Why do you weep?
FORGAEL. I weep because I’ve nothing for your eyes
But desolate waters and a battered ship.
FORGAEL. I weep — I weep because bare night’s above,
And not a roof of ivory and gold.
DECTORA. I would grow jealous of the ivory roof,
And strike the golden pillars with my hands.
I would that there was nothing in the world
But my beloved — that night and day had perished,
And all that is and all that is to be,
And all that is not the meeting of our lips.
FORGAEL. Why do you turn your eyes upon bare night?
Am I to fear the waves, or is the moon
My enemy?
DECTORA. I looked upon the moon,
Longing to knead and pull it into shape
That I might lay it on your head as a crown.
But now it is your thoughts that wander away,
For you are looking at the sea. Do you not know
How great a wrong it is to let one’s thought
Wander a moment when one is in love?
[He has moved away. She follows him. He is looking out over the sea, shading his eyes.
DECTORA. Why are you looking at the sea?
FORGAEL. — Look there!
There where the cloud creeps up upon the moon.
DECTORA. What is there but a troop of ash-grey birds
That fly into the west?
[The scene darkens, but there is a ray of light upon the figures.
FORGAEL. — But listen, listen!
DECTORA. What is there but the crying of the birds?
FORGAEL. If you’ll but listen closely to that crying
You’ll hear them calling out to one another
With human voices.
DECTORA. Clouds have hid the moon.
The birds cry out, what can I do but tremble?
FORGAEL. They have been circling over our heads in the air,
But now that they have taken to the road
We have to follow, for they are our pilots;
They’re crying out. Can you not hear their cry? —
‘There is a country at the end of the world
Where no child’s born but to outlive the moon.’
[The sailors come in with AIBRIC.
They carry torches.
AIBRIC. We have lit upon a treasure that’s so great
Imagination cannot reckon it.
The hold is full — boxes of precious spice,
Ivory images with amethyst eyes,
Dragons with eyes of ruby. The whole ship
Flashes as if it were a net of herrings.
Let us return to our own country, Forgael,
And spend it there. Have you not found this queen?
What more have you to look for on the seas?
FORGAEL. I cannot — I am going on to the end.
As for this woman, I think she is coming with me.
AIBRIC. Speak to him, lady, and bid him turn the ship.
He knows that he is taking you to death;
He cannot contradict me.
DECTORA. — Is that true?
FORGAEL. I do not know for certain.
DECTORA. — Carry me
To some sure country, some familiar place.
Have we not everything that life can give
In having one another?
FORGAEL. — How could I rest
If I refused the messengers and pilots
With all those sights and all that crying out?
DECTORA. I am a woman, I die at every breath.
AIBRIC [to the sailors]. To the other ship, for there’s no help in words.
And I will follow you and cut the rope
When I have said farewell to this man here,
For neither I nor any living man
Will look upon his face again.
[sailors go out, leaving one torch perhaps in a torch-holder on the bulwark.
FORGAEL [to DECTORA]. Go with him,
For he will shelter you and bring you home.
AIBRIC [taking FORGAEL’S hand], I’ll do it for his sake.
DECTORA. — No. Take this sword
And cut the rope, for I go on with Forgael.
AIBRIC. Farewell! Farewell!
[He goes out. The light grows stronger.
DECTORA. The sword is in the rope —
The rope’s in two — it falls into the sea,
It whirls into the foam. O ancient worm,
Dragon that loved the world and held us to it,
You are broken, you are broken. The world drifts away,
And I am left alone with my beloved,
Who cannot put me from his sight for ever.
We are alone for ever, and I laugh,
Forgael, because you cannot put me from you.
The mist has covered the heavens, and you and I
Shall be alone for ever. We two — this crown —
I half remember. It has been in my dreams.
Bend lower, O king, that I may crown you with it.
O flower of the branch, O bird among the leaves,
O silver fish that my two hands have taken
Out of the running stream, O morning star,
Trembling in the blue heavens like a white fawn
Upon the misty border of the wood,
Bend lower, that I may cover you with my hair,
For we will gaze upon this world no longer.
[The harp begins to burn as with fire.
FORGAEL [gathering DECTORA’s hair about hint].
Beloved, having dragged the net about us,
And knitted mesh to mesh, we grow immortal;
And that old harp awakens of itself
To cry aloud to the grey birds, and dreams,
That have had dreams for father, live in us.
DEIRDRE
TO MRS. PATRICK CAMPBELL
Who in the generosity of her genius has played my
Deirdre in Dub/in and London with the Abbey
Company, as well as with her own people, and
TO ROBERT GREGORY
who designed the beautiful scene she played it in.
THE HOUR-GLASS (VERSE VERSION)
PERSONS OF THE PLAY
WISE MAN.
BRIDGET, his wife.
TEIGUE, a fool.
ANGEL.
Children and Pupils.
THE HOUR-GLASS (Verse Version)
Pupils come in and stand before the stage curtain, which is still closed. One pupil carries a book.
FIRST PUPIL
He said we might choose the subject for the lesson.
SECOND PUPIL
There is none of us wise enough to do that.
THIRD PUPIL
It would need a great deal of wisdom to know what it is we want to know.
FOURTH PUPIL
I will question him.
FIFTH PUPIL
You?
FOURTH PUPIL
Last night I dreamt that some one came and told me to question him.
I was to say to him, ‘You were wrong to say there is no God and no
soul--maybe, if there is not much of either, there is yet some tatters,
some tag on the wind--so to speak--some rag upon a bush, some bob-tail
of a god.’ I will argue with him,--nonsense though it be--according to
my dream, and you will see how well I can argue, and what thoughts I have.
FIRST PUPIL
I’d as soon listen to dried peas in a bladder, as listen to your thoughts.
[Fool comes in.
FOOL
Give me a penny.
SECOND PUPIL
Let us choose a subject by chance. Here is his big book. Let us turn
over the pages slowly. Let one of us put down his finger without looking.
The passage his finger lights on will be the subject for the lesson.
FOOL
Give me a penny.
THIRD PUPIL
(Taking up book) How heavy it is
.
FOURTH PUPIL
Spread it on Teigue’s back, and then we can all stand round and see the
choice.
SECOND PUPIL
Make him spread out his arms.
FOURTH PUPIL
Down on your knees. Hunch up your back. Spread your arms out now, and
look like a golden eagle in a church. Keep still, keep still.
FOOL
Give me a penny.
THIRD PUPIL
Is that the right cry for an eagle cock?
SECOND PUPIL
I’ll turn the pages--you close your eyes and put your finger down.
THIRD PUPIL
That’s it, and then he cannot blame us for the choice.
FIRST PUPIL
There, I have chosen. Fool, keep still--and if what’s wise is strange
and sounds like nonsense, we’ve made a good choice.
FIFTH PUPIL
The Master has come.
FOOL
Will anybody give a penny to a fool?
[One of the pupils draws back the stage curtain showing the Master
sitting at his desk. There is an hour-glass upon his desk or in
a bracket on the wall. One pupil puts the book before him.
FIRST PUPIL
We have chosen the passage for the lesson, Master. ‘There are two
living countries, one visible and one invisible, and when it is summer
there, it is winter here, and when it is November with us, it is
lambing-time there.’