The Rose Tree
By: William Butler Yeats
Lecture 25
About the Poem
• It describes a fictional conversation between James
Connolly and Padraig Pearse, the leaders of the 1916
Easter Rising.
• They state that they are willing to give their own lives
to see the restoration of an Ireland governed by the
Irish.
• The overt symbolism is that of Christ’s crucifixion;
that Ireland will be resurrected anew if they spill
their blood for it.
Poem
'O WORDS are lightly spoken,'
Said Pearse to Connolly,
'Maybe a breath of politic words
Has withered our Rose Tree;
Or maybe but a wind that blows
Across the bitter sea.‘
The rose is a symbol of resurrection and Ireland here.
Stanza 2
"It needs to be but watered,'
James Connolly replied,
"To make the green come out again
And spread on every side,
And shake the blossom from the bud
To be the garden's pride.‘
Their country like the rose is drying up and dying.
Stanza 3
"But where can we draw water,'
Said Pearse to Connolly,
"When all the wells are parched away?
O plain as plain can be
There's nothing but our own red blood
Can make a right Rose Tree.'
Their land needs to be watered with their own blood.
Analysis
• Many themes are evoked including Irish
folklore, spirituality, unrequited love, and
Ireland’s struggle for independence.
• Yeats helped lead Irish Renaissance that
sought to restore the influence of Gaelic
language and culture on Irish literature.
Wilde Swoone at Coole
William Yeats
Stanza 1
THE TREES are in their autumn beauty,
The woodland paths are dry,
Under the October twilight the water
Mirrors a still sky;
He visits the lake at Augusta Gregory’s Coole Park after
19 years & is inspired by the beautiful, serene
surrounding while the day is drawing to its close.
Upon the brimming water among the stones
Are nine and fifty swans.
The poet walks down the dry woodland paths to the
water which mirrors the October twilight of the sky.
He observes 59 swans.
Stanza 2
The nineteenth Autumn has come upon me
Since I first made my count;
I saw, before I had well finished,
All suddenly mount
And scatter wheeling in great broken rings
Upon their clamorous wings.
The swans took flight while he was still counting and split
up in rings .
Clamorous: deafening sound of their wings.
Stanza 3
I have looked upon those brilliant creatures,
And now my heart is sore.
He feels that a lot has changed in his life.
All’s changed since I, hearing at twilight,
The first time on this shore,
The bell-beat of their wings above my head,
Trod with a lighter tread.
The First World War and the Irish Civil War have
changed everything.
Stanza 4
Unwearied still, lover by lover,
They paddle in the cold,
Companionable streams or climb the air;
The swans are not tired and swim or fly in pairs.
Their hearts have not grown old;
Passion or conquest, wander where they will,
Attend upon them still.
There is a sense of freedom about their movements.
Stanza 5
But now they drift on the still water
Mysterious, beautiful;
Among what rushes will they build,
The place has not lost its original beauty.
By what lake’s edge or pool
Delight men’s eyes, when I awake some day
To find they have flown away?
He feels all his dreams have fled.
Analysis
• The poem is set in five stanzas of six lines each. The
lines are of varying length, but long and short tend to
alternate. The rhyme scheme is ABCBDD.
• “The Wild Swans at Coole” is an evocative poem in
which Yeats uses a setting and the memory of an
experience, now being re-lived, to express his
awareness of the ageing process.
• The season of autumn and the time of twilight
symbolize the process of aging as nature dies away
and light fades.
• The beauty and freedom of the swans create a
contrast with Yeats experiences through sight and
sound effects.
• The birds have not aged or lost their ‘passion’ but
Yeats is aware that as youth passes the passions are
lost.
• There is a sad reality that aging is inevitable and the
change has to be confronted and accepted.