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A continuing selection of classic and contemporary poems.

The Fool By The Roadside

William Butler Yeats

(version of The Hero, The Girl And The Fool)

When all works that have
From cradle run to grave
From grave to cradle run instead;
When thoughts that a fool
Has wound upon a spool
Are but loose thread, are but loose thread;

When cradle and spool are past
And I mere shade at last
Coagulate of stuff
Transparent like the wind,
I think that I may find
A faithful love, a faithful love.
Online text © 1998-2008 Poetry X. All rights reserved.
From The Tower | 1928
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