The Gyres
The Gyres - context Summary
Published in 1939
Published near the end of Yeats's career, this poem appears in Last Poems (1939) and encapsulates his late philosophy of cyclical history. It invokes mythic figures and the image of 'gyres' to argue that cultural decay is part of larger rotations: old forms die but a spiritual renewal will recur. The speaker accepts corruption and loss while anticipating the recovery of noble, restorative figures and a more gracious age renewed from the ruins.
Read Complete AnalysesThe gyres! the gyres! Old Rocky Face, look forth; Things thought too long can be no longer thought, For beauty dies of beauty, worth of worth, And ancient lineaments are blotted out. Irrational streams of blood are staining earth; Empedocles has thrown all things about; Hector is dead and there's a light in Troy; We that look on but laugh in tragic joy. What matter though numb nightmare ride on top, And blood and mire the sensitive body stain? What matter? Heave no sigh, let no tear drop, A-greater, a more gracious time has gone; For painted forms or boxes of make-up In ancient tombs I sighed, but not again; What matter? Out of cavern comes a voice, And all it knows is that one word 'Rejoice!' Conduct and work grow coarse, and coarse the soul, What matter? Those that Rocky Face holds dear, Lovers of horses and of women, shall, From marble of a broken sepulchre, Or dark betwixt the polecat and the owl, Or any rich, dark nothing disinter The workman, noble and saint, and all things run On that unfashionable gyre again.
Feel free to be first to leave comment.