Nk, come to those who die every day they live, though their dying may
not be like the dying Shakespeare spoke of. There is a war between the
living and the dead, and the Irish stories keep harping upon it. They
will have it that when the potatoes or the wheat or any other of the
fruits of the earth decay, they ripen in faery, and that our dreams lose
their wisdom when the sap rises in the trees, and that our dreams can
make the trees wither, and that one hears the bleating of the lambs of
faery in November, and that blind eyes can see more than other eyes.
Because the soul always believes in these, or in like things, the cell
and the wilderness shall never be long empty, or lovers come into the
world who will not understand the verse-- Heardst thou not sweet words
among That heaven-resounding minstrelsy? Heardst thou not that those who
die Awake in a world of ecstasy? How love, when limbs are interwoven,
And sleep, when the night of life is cloven, And thought to the world's
dim boundaries clinging, And music when one's beloved is singing, Is
death? 1901. THE FRIENDS OF THE PEOPLE OF FAERY Those that see the
people of faery most often, and so have the most of their wisdom, are
often very poor, but often, too, they are thought to have a strength
beyond that of man, as though one came, when one has passed the
threshold of trance, to those sweet waters where Maeldun saw the
dishevelled eagles bathe and become young again. There was an old Martin
Roland, who lived near a bog a little out of Gort, who saw them often
from his young days, and always towards the end of his life, though I
would hardly call him their friend
TEXT ONLY EQUIVALENT Nk, come to those who die every day they live, though their dying may
not be like the dying Shakespeare spoke of. There is a war between the
living and the dead, and the Irish stories keep harping upon it. They
will have it that when the potatoes or the wheat or any other of the
fruits of the earth decay, they ripen in faery, and that our dreams lose
their wisdom when the sap rises in the trees, and that our dreams can
make the trees wither, and that one hears the bleating of the lambs of
faery in November, and that blind eyes can see more than other eyes.
Because the soul always believes in these, or in like things, the cell
and the wilderness shall never be long empty, or lovers come into the
world who will not understand the verse-- Heardst thou not sweet words
among That heaven-resounding minstrelsy? Heardst thou not that those who
die Awake in a world of ecstasy? How love, when limbs are interwoven,
And sleep, when the night of life is cloven, And thought to the world's
dim boundaries clinging, And music when one's beloved is singing, Is
death? 1901. THE FRIENDS OF THE PEOPLE OF FAERY Those that see the
people of faery most often, and so have the most of their wisdom, are
often very poor, but often, too, they are thought to have a strength
beyond that of man, as though one came, when one has passed the
threshold of trance, to those sweet waters where Maeldun saw the
dishevelled eagles bathe and become young again. There was an old Martin
Roland, who lived near a bog a little out of Gort, who saw them often
from his young days, and always towards the end of his life, though I
would hardly call him their friend
