When you consider the radiance, that it does not withhold
itself but pours its abundance without selection into every
nook and cranny not overhung or hidden; when you consider

that birds' bones make no awful noise against the light but
lie low in the light as in a high testimony; when you consider
the radiance, that it will look into the guiltiest

swervings of the weaving heart and bear itself upon them,
not flinching into disguise or darkening; when you consider
the abundance of such resource as illuminates the glow-blue

bodies and gold-skeined wings of flies swarming the dumped
guts of a natural slaughter or the coil of shit and in no
way winces from its storms of generosity; when you consider

that air or vacuum, snow or shale, squid or wolf, rose or lichen,
each is accepted into as much light as it will take, then
the heart moves roomier, the man stands and looks about, the

leaf does not increase itself above the grass, and the dark
work of the deepest cells is of a tune with May bushes
and fear lit by the breadth of such calmly turns to praise.

When the Present has latched its postern behind my tremulous stay,
     And the May month flaps its glad green leaves like wings,
Delicate-filmed as new-spun silk, will the neighbours say,
     "He was a man who used to notice such things"? 

If it be in the dusk when, like an eyelid's soundless blink,
     The dewfall-hawk comes crossing the shades to alight
Upon the wind-warped upland thorn, a gazer may think,
     "To him this must have been a familiar sight."

If I pass during some nocturnal blackness, mothy and warm,
     When the hedgehog travels furtively over the lawn,
One may say, "He strove that such innocent creatures should
        come to no harm,
     But he could do little for them; and now he is gone."

If, when hearing that I have been stilled at last, they stand at
        the door,
     Watching the full-starred heavens that winter sees,
Will this thought rise on those who will meet my face no more,
     "He was one who had an eye for such mysteries"?

And will any say when my bell of quittance is heard in the gloom,
     And a crossing breeze cuts a pause in its outrollings,
Till they rise again, as they were a new bell's boom,
     "He hears it not now, but used to notice such things?"

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee;
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet’s wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,
I hear it in the deep heart’s core.

  We were very tired, we were very merry—
  We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
  It was bare and bright, and smelled like a stable—
  But we looked into a fire, we leaned across a table,
  We lay on a hill-top underneath the moon;
  And the whistles kept blowing, and the dawn came soon.

  We were very tired, we were very merry—
  We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry;
  And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear,
  From a dozen of each we had bought somewhere;
  And the sky went wan, and the wind came cold,
  And the sun rose dripping, a bucketful of gold.

  We were very tired, we were very merry,
  We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.
  We hailed, "Good morrow, mother!" to a shawl-covered head,
  And bought a morning paper, which neither of us read;
  And she wept, "God bless you!" for the apples and pears,
  And we gave her all our money but our subway fares.