"/An_Irish_Airman_Foresees_his_Death An Irish Airman Foresees his Death, 1919"

William Butler Yeats Literature See all quotes by William Butler Yeats →

React to this quote

More by William Butler Yeats

“Do what you will. I do not understand stops. I write my work so completely for the ear that I feel helpless when I have to measure pauses by stops & commas.”

“The friends that have it I do wrongWhenever I remake a songShould know what issue is at stake,It is myself that I remake.”

“The years like great black oxen tread the world,And God the herdsman goads them on behind,And I am broken by their passing feet.”

“You are still wrecked among heathen dreams.”

“Words are always getting conventionalized to some secondary meaning. It is one of the works of poetry to take the truants in custody and bring them back to their right senses. Poets are the policemen of language; they are always arresting those old reprobates the words.”

“Alphabetical Listing of Poems by Yeats”

Resonant Thoughts

"Capitalism is dying and its extremities are already decomposing. The blotches upon the surface show that the blood no longer circulates. The time is near when the cadaver will have to be removed and t…"

— Eugene V. Debs

Politics1855–1926

#death

"But if you can breed cattle for milk yield, horses for running speed, and dogs for herding skill, why on Earth should it be impossible to breed humans for mathematical, musical or athletic ability? Ob…"

— Richard Dawkins

Science1941

#time

"A permanent state of transition is man's most noble condition. When we say an artist is in a state of transition, many believe that we are belittling. In my opinion when people speak of an art of tran…"

— Juan Ramón Jiménez

Literature1881–1958

#time

"Death is not yet dead everywhere. Some points and surfaces still resist and budge and cry out, doubtless because it is dawn; and once the wind swept away a muffled bugle-call. There are some who still…"

— Henri Barbusse

Literature1910–1939

#life