Among School Children

Among School Children written by William Butler Yeats

1928

I walk through the long schoolroom questioning;<br>
A kind old nun in a white hood replies;<br>
The children learn to cipher and to sing,<br>
To study reading - books and histories,<br>
To cut and sew, be neat in everything<br>
In the best modern way - the children's eyes<br>
In momentary wonder stare upon<br>
A sixty-year-old smiling public man.<br><br>
I dream of a Ledaean body, bent<br>
Above a sinking fire,  a tale that she<br>
Told of a harsh reproof, or trivial event<br>
That changed some childish day to tragedy -<br>
Told, and it seemed that our two natures blent<br>
Into a sphere from youthful sympathy,<br>
Or else, to alter Plato's parable,<br>
Into the yolk and white of the one shell.<br><br>
And thinking of that fit of grief or rage<br>
I look upon one child or t'other there<br>
And wonder if she stood so at that age -<br>
For even daughters of the swan can share<br>
Something of every paddler's heritage -<br>
And had that colour upon cheek or hair,<br>
And thereupon my heart is driven wild:<br>
She stands before me as a living child.<br><br>
Her present image floats into the mind -
<br>Did Quattrocento finger fashion it<br>
Hollow of cheek as though it drank the wind<br>
And took a mess of shadows for its meat?<br>
And I though never of Ledaean kind<br>
Had pretty plumage once - enough of that,<br>
Better to smile on all that smile, and show<br>
There is a comfortable kind of old scarecrow.<br><br>
What youthful mother, a shape upon her lap<br>
Honey of generation had betrayed,<br>
And that must sleep, shriek, struggle to escape<br>
As recollection or the drug decide,<br>
Would think her Son, did she but see that shape<br>
With sixty or more winters on its head,<br>
A compensation for the pang of his birth,<br>
Or the uncertainty of his setting forth?<br><br>
Plato thought nature but a spume that plays<br>
Upon a ghostly paradigm of things;<br>
Solider Aristotle played the taws<br>
Upon the bottom of a king of kings;<br>
World-famous golden-thighed Pythagoras<br>
Fingered upon a fiddle-stick or strings<br>
What a star sang and careless Muses heard:<br>
Old clothes upon old sticks to scare a bird.<br><br>
Both nuns and mothers worship images,<br>
But those the candles light are not as those<br>
That animate a mother's reveries,<br>
But keep a marble or a bronze repose.<br>
And yet they too break hearts - O presences<br>
That passion, piety or affection knows,<br>
And that all heavenly glory symbolise -<br>
O self-born mockers of man's enterprise;<br><br>
Labour is blossoming or dancing where<br>
The body is not bruised to pleasure soul.<br>
Nor beauty born out of its own despair,<br>
Nor blear-eyed wisdom out of midnight oil.<br>
O chestnut-tree, great-rooted blossomer,<br>
Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole?<br>
O body swayed to music, O brightening glance,<br>
How can we know the dancer from the dance?<br>