Solomon to Sheba

W. B. Yeatsfirst published 1919from The Wild Swans at Coole24 lines

Sang Solomon to Sheba,And kissed her dusky face,“All day long from mid-dayWe have talked in the one place,All day long from shadowless noonWe have gone round and roundIn the narrow theme of loveLike an old horse in a pound.”

To Solomon sang Sheba,Planted on his knees,“If you had broached a matterThat might the learned please,You had before the sun had thrownOur shadows on the groundDiscovered that my thoughts, not it,Are but a narrow pound.”

Sang Solomon to Sheba,And kissed her Arab eyes,“There’s not a man or womanBorn under the skiesDare match in learning with us two,And all day long we have foundThere’s not a thing but love can makeThe world a narrow pound.”

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

In brief

Summary

Solomon and Sheba tease each other about love and learning.

King Solomon sings to the Queen of Sheba that all day they have talked of nothing but love, going round and round "Like an old horse in a pound". Sheba, sitting on his knee, answers that if he had raised a learned subject she would have shown before evening that her own thoughts, not love, are the narrow enclosure. Solomon's reply ends the game: no man or woman alive can match the two of them in learning, and they have found that only love can make the world narrow. The poem is a playful love duet.

Lines to remember

Like an old horse in a pound."

There's not a thing but love can make

The world a narrow pound."

Line by line

Lines 1 to 8Solomon's complaint
Solomon, kissing "her dusky face", complains that they have circled "the narrow theme of love" all day. The simile "Like an old horse in a pound" is homely and funny from a famously wise king.
Lines 9 to 16Sheba's reply
"Planted on his knees", Sheba turns the charge around: had he raised a subject "That might the learned please", he would soon have found that her mind, not love, is "but a narrow pound". She teases herself and him at once.
Lines 17 to 24Love's pound
Solomon answers with a compliment: no one "Dare match in learning with us two". Yet their long day's discovery is that love alone can shrink the whole world to "a narrow pound", and the poem suggests they are happy to be enclosed.

Themes

Love and learning

Solomon and Sheba are the two wisest people alive, yet love is the one subject they cannot get beyond. The poem jokes that love narrows even the greatest minds, while showing that their talk of love is itself clever, lively and shared.

Playful partnership

The lovers are equals. Each takes a turn to sing, each teases, and Solomon's last stanza praises "us two" together. The kisses and Sheba "Planted on his knees" make it a picture of intimacy that is also a conversation, in which wit and affection feed each other.

Context

The poem was collected in the enlarged edition of The Wild Swans at Coole (Macmillan, 1919). In the Bible, the Queen of Sheba visits King Solomon to test his wisdom with hard questions. The poem is usually read as a light-hearted portrait of Yeats and his young wife, George, whom he married in 1917; the pair return in later poems such as "Solomon and the Witch".

Form

Three eight-line stanzas, like a sung dialogue, with the opening line reversed and repeated ("Sang Solomon to Sheba", "To Solomon sang Sheba"). Lines 2 and 4, and 6 and 8, rhyme in each stanza, and every stanza ends on the word "pound", so the refrain itself goes round and round.