He and She
About the text
Yeats first published this poem in 1934. It is out of copyright in Ireland and the EU, but in the United States it stays in copyright until the start of 2030, and this site is served partly from American servers. So for now we give the notes without the full text; it will appear here in 2030.
It begins: As the moon sidles up
In brief
SummaryThe soul, like the moon, draws near to God and flies away.
A small song about the moon and the sun, and through them the soul and God. She moves as the moon moves, sidling up towards him and then tripping away in fear, because his light would blind her if she stayed. Yet as she goes she sings of her own selfhood: the further she flies, the greater her light. All creation shivers at that sweet cry.
Lines to remember
'I am I, am I;
Line by line
Lines 1 to 6Sidling up
As the moon sidles up to the sun, so she must sidle up; as the moon trips away in fear, so must she. If she dared to stop, his light would strike her blind. She is drawn to him and must keep her distance to survive.
Lines 7 to 12I am I
She sings the moon's song, asserting her own identity over and over. The greater her light, the further she flies. The more she becomes herself, the further she moves from him. Creation itself shivers at the cry.
Themes
Soul and God
"He" and "She" are sun and moon, and also God and the soul, or any lover and beloved. She cannot come too close without being blinded, nor stay away without losing him. The poem catches a rhythm of approach and retreat that Yeats saw in the soul's whole history.
Selfhood
Her song is a cry of identity. Like the moon, which is fullest when furthest from the sun, she shines brightest when she is most separate. The shiver of creation at her cry suggests that this separateness is both a joy and a kind of daring.
Context
The poem is the sixth of the Supernatural Songs, which first appeared in a book in The King of the Great Clock Tower, Commentaries and Poems (Cuala Press, 1934), and were collected in A Full Moon in March (Macmillan, 1935). The moon's phases were central to Yeats's system in A Vision, where they stand for types of human soul, the full moon being the most complete selfhood.
Form
Two six-line stanzas of short, two- and three-beat lines, lightly and irregularly rhymed, with the second stanza chiming on "I", "fly" and "cry". The quick, skittish lines move like the moon they describe, and the repeated "sidle" and "trip" give a dance-like step.