The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats. Volume 2 of 8. William Butler Yeats

      If you would speak to him,

      You might not find persuasion difficult,

      With all the devils of hunger helping you.

      I will not interfere, and if he starve

      For being obstinate and stiff in the neck,

      ’Tis but good riddance.

      One of us must do it.

      It might be, if you’d reason with him, ladies,

      He would eat something, for I have a notion

      That if he brought misfortune on the King,

      Or the King’s house, we’d be as little thought of

      As summer linen when the winter’s come.

      But it would be the greater compliment

      If Peter’d do it.

      Reason with him, Peter.

      Persuade him to eat; he’s such a bag of bones!

      I’ll never trust a woman’s word again!

      There’s nobody that was so loud against him

      When he was at the table; now the wind’s changed,

      And you that could not bear his speech or his silence,

      Would have him there in his old place again;

      I do believe you would, but I won’t help you.

      Why will you be so hard upon us, Peter?

      You know we have turned the common sort against us,

      And he looks miserable.

      We cannot dance,

      Because no harper will pluck a string for us.

      I cannot sleep with thinking of his face.

      And I love dancing more than anything.

      Do not be hard on us; but yesterday

      A woman in the road threw stones at me.

      You would not have me stoned?

      May I not dance?

      I will do nothing. You have put him out,

      And now that he is out – well, leave him out.

      Do it for my sake, Peter.

      And for mine.

      Well, well; but not your way. [To SEANCHAN.] Here’s meat for you.

      It has been carried from too good a table

      For men like you, and I am offering it

      Because these women have made a fool of me.

      You mean to starve? You will have none of it?

      I’ll leave it there, where you can sniff the savour.

      Snuff it, old hedgehog, and unroll yourself!

      But if I were the King, I’d make you do it

      With wisps of lighted straw.

      You have rightly named me.

      I lie rolled up under the ragged thorns

      That are upon the edge of those great waters

      Where all things vanish away, and I have heard

      Murmurs that are the ending of all sound.

      I am out of life; I am rolled up, and yet,

      Hedgehog although I am, I’ll not unroll

      For you, King’s dog! Go to the King, your master.

      Crouch down and wag your tail, for it may be

      He has nothing now against you, and I think

      The stripes of your last beating are all healed.

      Put up your sword, sir; put it up, I say!

      The common sort would tear you into pieces

      If you but touched him.

      If he’s to be flattered,

      Petted, cajoled, and dandled into humour,

      We might as well have left him at the table.

      You must need keep your patience yet awhile,

      For I have some few mouthfuls of sweet air

      To swallow before I have grown to be as civil

      As any other dust.

      You wrong us, Seanchan.

      There is none here but holds you in respect;

      And if you’d only eat out of this dish,

      The King would show how much he honours you.

      Who could imagine you’d so take to heart

      Being put from the high table? I am certain

      That you, if you will only think it over,

      Will understand that it is men of law,

      Leaders of the King’s armies, and the like,

      That should sit there.

      Somebody has deceived you,

      Or maybe it was your own eyes that lied,

      In making it appear that I was driven

      From the King’s table. You have driven away

      The images of them that weave a dance

      By the four rivers in the mountain garden.

      You mean we have driven poetry away.

      But that’s not altogether true, for I,

      As you should know, have written poetry.

      And often when the table has been cleared,

      And candles lighted, the King calls for me,

      And I repeat it him. My poetry

      Is not to be compared with yours; but still,

      Where I am honoured, poetry is honoured —

      In some measure.

      If you are a poet,

      Cry out that the King’s money would not buy,

      Nor the high circle consecrate his head,

      If