Old Memory

W. B. Yeatsfirst published 1903from In the Seven Woods12 lines

O thought, fly to her when the end of dayAwakens an old memory, and say,“Your strength, that is so lofty and fierce and kind,It might call up a new age, calling to mindThe queens that were imagined long ago,Is but half yours: he kneaded in the doughThrough the long years of youth, and who would have thoughtIt all, and more than it all, would come to naught,And that dear words meant nothing?” But enough,For when we have blamed the wind we can blame love;Or, if there needs be more, be nothing saidThat would be harsh for children that have strayed.

Text: Poetry, by W. B. Yeats (Standard Ebooks, 2024), from the collected editions of 1908 to 1928. Public domain.

In brief

Summary

The poet claims a share in a woman's greatness, then softens his reproach.

At the end of the day an old memory wakes, and the speaker sends his thought to her with a message. Her strength, "so lofty and fierce and kind", seems able to call up a new age like the queens of old legend. But it is "but half yours", the thought is to say: he helped to shape it through the long years of his youth, and none could have guessed it would all come to nothing. Then he stops himself. Blaming love is as useless as blaming the wind, and nothing harsh should be said "for children that have strayed".

Lines to remember

O thought, fly to her when the end of day

For when we have blamed the wind we can blame love;

Line by line

Lines 1 to 2Sending a thought
The poem begins as a message. As day ends, "an old memory" wakes, and he tells his own thought to fly to her and speak for him, as if he could not bear to go himself.
Lines 3 to 8Half yours
The message praises her strength, "so lofty and fierce and kind", fit to call up a new age and bring to mind "The queens that were imagined long ago". Then the sting: it "Is but half yours". He "kneaded in the dough" through the long years of his youth, and it all came "to naught".
Lines 9 to 12But enough
The message ends bitterly, asking whether "dear words meant nothing". Then he checks himself: "But enough". Blaming love is as useless as blaming the wind, and nothing should be said "That would be harsh for children that have strayed". The last words forgive them both.

Themes

Love and resentment

The poem shows a feeling being restrained. The middle is proud and hurt: he claims a share of her greatness and asks whether "dear words meant nothing". The close pulls back. Calling them both "children that have strayed" turns accusation into shared frailty, and the quarrel is dropped before it is ever sent.

Myth and a real woman

Her strength is compared to "The queens that were imagined long ago", the heroic women of legend. The homely image of kneading dough claims that the poet helped to make that heroic image, through years of devotion and verse. The myth around her, he suggests, was shaped in part by hands like his.

Context

Collected in In the Seven Woods (1903). The early text began "I thought to fly to her when the end of day"; the later version, printed here, turns that into a direct command, "O thought, fly to her". The poem is generally read as addressed to Maud Gonne, whom Yeats had loved since 1889.

Form

Twelve lines of iambic pentameter in rhyming couplets ("day" and "say", "ago" and "dough", "said" and "strayed"), with the sentences running over the line ends. The half rhyme of "enough" and "love" comes just as he checks himself, and the blunt "But enough" breaks in at the end of line 9.

Revised: 1903/1908 text begins 'I thought to fly to her when the end of day' (Gutenberg 30652, 49608); later text 'O thought, fly to her when the end of day' (Standard Ebooks, Collected Poems 1933).