The Phases of the Moon

W. B. Yeatsfirst published 1919from The Wild Swans at Coole147 lines

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An old man cocked his ear upon a bridge;He and his friend, their faces to the South,Had trod the uneven road. Their boots were soiled,Their Connemara cloth worn out of shape;They had kept a steady pace as though their beds,Despite a dwindling and late risen moon,Were distant. An old man cocked his ear.

Aherne

What made that sound?

Robartes

A rat or water-henSplashed, or an otter slid into the stream.We are on the bridge; that shadow is the tower,And the light proves that he is reading still.He has found, after the manner of his kind,Mere images; chosen this place to live inBecause, it may be, of the candle lightFrom the far tower where Milton’s platonistSat late, or Shelley’s visionary prince:The lonely light that Samuel Palmer engraved,An image of mysterious wisdom won by toil;And now he seeks in book or manuscriptWhat he shall never find.

Aherne

Why should not youWho know it all ring at his door, and speakJust truth enough to show that his whole lifeWill scarcely find for him a broken crustOf all those truths that are your daily bread;And when you have spoken take the roads again?

Robartes

He wrote of me in that extravagant styleHe had learnt from Pater, and to round his taleSaid I was dead; and dead I choose to be.

Aherne

Sing me the changes of the moon once more;True song, though speech: “mine author sung it me.”

Robartes

Twenty-and-eight the phases of the moon,The full and the moon’s dark and all the crescents,Twenty-and-eight, and yet but six-and-twentyThe cradles that a man must needs be rocked in:For there’s no human life at the full or the dark.From the first crescent to the half, the dreamBut summons to adventure and the manIs always happy like a bird or a beast;But while the moon is rounding towards the fullHe follows whatever whim’s most difficultAmong whims not impossible, and though scarredAs with the cat-o’-nine-tails of the mind,His body moulded from within his bodyGrows comelier. Eleven pass, and thenAthenae takes Achilles by the hair,Hector is in the dust, Nietzsche is born,Because the heroes’ crescent is the twelfth.And yet, twice born, twice buried, grow he must,Before the full moon, helpless as a worm.The thirteenth moon but sets the soul at warIn its own being, and when that war’s begunThere is no muscle in the arm; and afterUnder the frenzy of the fourteenth moonThe soul begins to tremble into stillness,To die into the labyrinth of itself!

Aherne

Sing out the song; sing to the end, and singThe strange reward of all that discipline.

Robartes

All thought becomes an image and the soulBecomes a body: that body and that soulToo perfect at the full to lie in a cradle,Too lonely for the traffic of the world:Body and soul cast out and cast awayBeyond the visible world.

Aherne

All dreams of the soulEnd in a beautiful man’s or woman’s body.

Robartes

Have you not always known it?

Aherne

The song will have itThat those that we have loved got their long fingersFrom death, and wounds, or on Sinai’s top,Or from some bloody whip in their own hands.They ran from cradle to cradle till at lastTheir beauty dropped out of the lonelinessOf body and soul.

Robartes

The lovers’ heart knows that.

Aherne

It must be that the terror in their eyesIs memory or foreknowledge of the hourWhen all is fed with light and heaven is bare.

Robartes

When the moon’s full those creatures of the fullAre met on the waste hills by country menWho shudder and hurry by: body and soulEstranged amid the strangeness of themselves,Caught up in contemplation, the mind’s eyeFixed upon images that once were thought,For separate, perfect, and immovableImages can break the solitudeOf lovely, satisfied, indifferent eyes.
And thereupon with aged, high-pitched voiceAherne laughed, thinking of the man within,His sleepless candle and laborious pen.

Robartes

And after that the crumbling of the moon.The soul remembering its lonelinessShudders in many cradles; all is changed,It would be the world’s servant, and as it serves,Choosing whatever task’s most difficultAmong tasks not impossible, it takesUpon the body and upon the soulThe coarseness of the drudge.

Aherne

Before the fullIt sought itself and afterwards the world.

Robartes

Because you are forgotten, half out of life,And never wrote a book your thought is clear.Reformer, merchant, statesman, learned man,Dutiful husband, honest wife by turn,Cradle upon cradle, and all in flight and allDeformed because there is no deformityBut saves us from a dream.

Aherne

And what of thoseThat the last servile crescent has set free?

Robartes

Because all dark, like those that are all light,They are cast beyond the verge, and in a cloud,Crying to one another like the bats;And having no desire they cannot tellWhat’s good or bad, or what it is to triumphAt the perfection of one’s own obedience;And yet they speak what’s blown into the mind;Deformed beyond deformity, unformed,Insipid as the dough before it is baked,They change their bodies at a word.

Aherne

And then?

Robartes

When all the dough has been so kneaded upThat it can take what form cook Nature fancyThe first thin crescent is wheeled round once more.

Aherne

But the escape; the song’s not finished yet.

Robartes

Hunchback and saint and fool are the last crescents.The burning bow that once could shoot an arrowOut of the up and down, the wagon wheelOf beauty’s cruelty and wisdom’s chatter⁠—Out of that raving tide⁠—is drawn betwixtDeformity of body and of mind.

Aherne

Were not our beds far off I’d ring the bell,Stand under the rough roof-timbers of the hallBeside the castle door, where all is starkAusterity, a place set out for wisdomThat he will never find; I’d play a part;He would never know me after all these yearsBut take me for some drunken country man;I’d stand and mutter there until he caught“Hunchback and saint and fool,” and that they cameUnder the three last crescents of the moon,And then I’d stagger out. He’d crack his witsDay after day, yet never find the meaning.
And then he laughed to think that what seemed hardShould be so simple⁠—a bat rose from the hazelsAnd circled round him with its squeaky cry,The light in the tower window was put out.

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

In brief

Summary

Two old wanderers explain the moon's phases outside a poet's tower.

Late at night two old men, Michael Robartes and Owen Aherne, stop on a bridge below a tower where a light shows that a scholar is still reading. The man in the tower is never named but is usually taken as Yeats himself, and the two mock him for seeking in books what he will never find. At Aherne's request Robartes chants the doctrine of the twenty-eight phases of the moon: how the soul passes through a cycle of lives, from the animal ease of the first crescents, through the heroic struggle that leads to the full moon, where thought becomes image and the soul becomes pure body, and then back into service of the world and the formless dark. The last crescents belong to "Hunchback and saint and fool". Aherne toys with the idea of knocking to mutter the secret and leave the scholar puzzled. Then he laughs, a bat circles, and the light in the tower goes out.

Lines to remember

Twenty-and-eight the phases of the moon,
Hunchback and saint and fool are the last crescents.
The light in the tower window was put out.

Line by line

  1. Lines 1 to 7On the bridge

    A narrator introduces two old men in worn Connemara cloth, walking south on a rough road under a "dwindling and late risen moon". The framing line "An old man cocked his ear" opens and closes the passage, like a story beginning.

  2. Lines 8 to 21The scholar in the tower

    Aherne hears a sound; Robartes names the splash and points out "the tower", where "the light proves that he is reading still". The man inside chose the place for its lonely candle, the light of Milton's platonist, Shelley's prince and Samuel Palmer's engraving, and seeks in books "What he shall never find".

  3. Lines 22 to 32Why not tell him

    Aherne asks why Robartes does not ring the bell and give the man a crumb of truth. Robartes answers with a grudge: "He wrote of me in that extravagant style / He had learnt from Pater", and said he was dead, "and dead I choose to be". Aherne asks him to sing the moon's changes once more.

  4. Lines 33 to 57Towards the full

    Robartes begins: twenty-eight phases, but only twenty-six "cradles", since no human life is possible at full or dark. The early crescents bring a life "happy like a bird or a beast"; then comes struggle, the heroes' twelfth phase ("Athenae takes Achilles by the hair"), and at the thirteenth and fourteenth the soul begins "To die into the labyrinth of itself".

  5. Lines 58 to 68The full moon

    Aherne asks for the "strange reward" of that discipline. At the full, "All thought becomes an image and the soul / Becomes a body", too perfect for any cradle and cast "Beyond the visible world". Aherne adds that "All dreams of the soul" end in a beautiful body, and Robartes asks if he had not always known it.

  6. Lines 69 to 79Where beauty comes from

    Aherne says the song claims that those we have loved got their beauty from death, wounds, Sinai or "some bloody whip in their own hands", running from cradle to cradle. Robartes answers "The lovers' heart knows that", and Aherne sees the terror in beautiful eyes as foreknowledge of the full moon's burning light.

  7. Lines 80 to 91Creatures of the full

    Robartes describes the "creatures of the full" met on "the waste hills by country men", who shudder and hurry by. Their eyes are fixed on images that were once thought. The narrator returns: Aherne laughs in his "aged, high-pitched voice", thinking of the man inside with his "sleepless candle and laborious pen".

  8. Lines 92 to 101The crumbling moon

    After the full comes "the crumbling of the moon". The soul, remembering its loneliness, now wants to be "the world's servant", choosing the hardest possible tasks and taking on "The coarseness of the drudge". Aherne sums it up: before the full the soul "sought itself and afterwards the world".

  9. Lines 102 to 110Useful lives

    Robartes praises Aherne's clear thinking, since he is "forgotten" and "never wrote a book". He lists the lives of the late phases, "Reformer, merchant, statesman, learned man", all "Deformed", because any deformity saves us "from a dream". Aherne asks about those set free by "the last servile crescent".

  10. Lines 111 to 124The dark of the moon

    At the dark, souls are cast "beyond the verge", crying "like the bats", without desire, unable to tell good from bad. They are "Insipid as the dough before it is baked". When the dough is kneaded ready for any form "cook Nature" likes, "The first thin crescent is wheeled round once more".

  11. Lines 125 to 131The last crescents

    Aherne asks about "the escape". Robartes names the final phases, "Hunchback and saint and fool", and gives a knotted image: the "burning bow" that could shoot an arrow out of the endless wheel of beauty's cruelty and wisdom's chatter is drawn between deformity of body and of mind.

  12. Lines 132 to 147The light goes out

    Aherne imagines ringing the bell, playing a drunken countryman, muttering "Hunchback and saint and fool" and staggering off, leaving the scholar to "crack his wits" for ever. He laughs at how simple the hard thing is; a bat rises from the hazels, and "The light in the tower window was put out."

Themes

Cycles of the soul

The heart of the poem is Robartes's song of the twenty-eight phases. Each phase is a kind of human life, a "cradle" the soul is "rocked in", and the cycle runs from animal ease through heroic struggle to the full, then into service, and back through the dark: "The first thin crescent is wheeled round once more".

Beauty and struggle

At the full, "All thought becomes an image and the soul / Becomes a body". Beauty is not a gift but the reward of discipline: the beloved's "long fingers" come from "death, and wounds" or "some bloody whip in their own hands". Such perfection is lonely, "Too lonely for the traffic of the world".

Wisdom and books

The scholar in the tower toils by candlelight, but the wanderers insist he will "never find" what he seeks in "book or manuscript". Aherne's clarity comes because he "never wrote a book". The joke is at Yeats's own expense: the poem gives its secret to the reader while the tower's light goes out.

Context

The poem was added to The Wild Swans at Coole in the enlarged Macmillan edition of 1919. It is an early poetic statement of the system of lunar phases that Yeats later set out in his prose book A Vision (1925). That system grew out of the automatic writing his wife George began soon after their marriage in October 1917.

Michael Robartes and Owen Aherne are characters from Yeats's stories of the 1890s, such as "Rosa Alchemica", which is the "extravagant style" learnt from the critic Walter Pater that Robartes complains of. The tower, with its hall and "castle door", is usually taken as Thoor Ballylee, the tower in County Galway Yeats bought in 1917, so the scholar inside is the poet himself.

The lonely candle-lit tower has literary ancestors named in the poem: the "high lonely tower" of the thinker in Milton's "Il Penseroso", the tower of Shelley's Prince Athanase, and Samuel Palmer's engraving "The Lonely Tower". "The Saint and the Hunchback" and "The Double Vision of Michael Robartes", in the same book, develop the phases further.

Form

Blank verse, unrhymed iambic pentameter, framed by a short narrative at the start, middle and end, with the rest a dialogue between Aherne and Robartes. Many speeches begin in broken half-lines ("What made that sound?", "And then?"), which keep the long teaching song rooted in two old men talking on a bridge.

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