When You Are Old

When you are old and gray and full of sleep,
and nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep:
















How many loved your moments of glad grace,
And loved your beauty with love false or true;
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face.









And bending down beside the glowing bars
Murmur, a little sadly, how love fled
and paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.

William Butler Yeats

Tabor family photos

William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) was perhaps the most distinguished poet of the early twentieth century. Yeats fused elements of his Irish heritage with a modern temperament to create a matchless body of moving, well-wrought verse.

this poem is dedicated to the memory of my grandmother
Sarah Lucinda Bartlett Tabor
Love Mimi