I heard the old, old men say, 'Everything alters, And one b… - William Butler Yeats

" "
I heard the old, old men say,
'Everything alters,
And one by one we drop away.'
They had hands like claws, and their knees
Were twisted like the old thorn-trees
By the waters.
I heard the old, old men say,
'All that's beautiful drifts away
Like the waters.'

William Butler Yeats

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About William Butler Yeats

William Butler Yeats (13 June 1865 – 28 January 1939) was an Irish symbolist poet, dramatist and mystic. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1923. He compiled the Oxford Book of Modern Verse.

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Also Known As

Alternative Names: W. B. Yeats • William Yeats • W.B. Yeats • WBY

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I heard the old, old, men say 'all that's beautiful drifts away, like the waters.

Originators like William Butler Yeats:

Lord Byron Alfred Tennyson John Keats Samuel Taylor Coleridge Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Additional quotes by William Butler Yeats

One loses, as one grows older, something of the lightness of one's dreams; one begins to take life up in both hands, and to care more for the fruit than the flower, and that is no great loss perhaps.

A man awaits his end
Dreading and hoping all;
Many times he died,
Many times rose again

every one is a visionary, if you scratch him deep enough. But the Celt is a visionary without scratching.

I heard the old, old men say, 'Everything alters, And one by one we drop away.' They had hands like claws, and their knees Were twisted like the old … - William Butler Yeats

About William Butler Yeats

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