Sailing to Byzantium That is no country for old men. The young In one another’s arms, birds in the trees Those dying generations at their song. I would rather be The man who thinks not of its end. For it is no country for old men, the young Meet their desires in the sea, in the sky.

As I turn far off, I see the shores of gold, And find the subtlety of their song Encapsulated in an island’s rhyme All echo out of ancient events:

Come on the wind, come on the breath of time, To lift me above the cobwebs of mankind’s design.

In the light of knowledge and in its destruction, Show me what would be born of beauty’s thought, And let the flow of the days show a great return, Until I become one with their paths in dawn.

• William Butler Yeats