this man is confusing me especially the series of poems: "the lady's 1st song", "the lady's 2nd song" and "the ladys third song". the latter is the one i am most confused with as i dont understand the meaning.

When you and my true lover meet
And he plays tunes between your feet.
Speak no evil of the soul,
Nor think that body is the whole,
For i that am his daylight lady
Know worse evil of the body;
But in honour split his love
Till neither either have enough,
That i may hear if we should kiss
A contrapuntal serpent hiss,
You, should hand explore a thigh,
All the labouring heavens sigh.

Please help i dont get the meaning of the poem and some of the phrases have confused me "contrapuntal serpent hiss" "you,should hand explore a thigh all the labouring heavens sigh"

Yeats is never straightforward. This sounds like a woman warning some other woman off of her husband. (the subject of most country music that I've heard)

I think that the serpent is a hint about temptation and the Devil.

In "you,should hand explore a thigh all the labouring heavens sigh"
Yeats has left out 'will hear'. Here's my reading:


When you and my true lover meet
And he plays tunes between your feet.

--When you and my husband get together

Speak no evil of the soul,
Nor think that body is the whole,

--Remember, there's another world where you'll pay for this (it's a jump, but it's what I think the line means)


For i that am his daylight lady
Know worse evil of the body;

--I, his wife, have also sinned

But in honour split his love
Till neither either have enough,

--So we might as well share him

That i may hear if we should kiss
A contrapuntal serpent hiss,
You, should hand explore a thigh,
All the labouring heavens sigh.

--By sharing this man, you and I will be so close that when one of us has sexual contact with him, the other will know it.

pam

Illuminating 'translation', Pam. Well done.

>When you and my true lover meet
>And he plays tunes between your feet.

Probably too risqué of me to mention it, but has anyone else noticed how a lady's toes move at the moment of orgasm? Almost like playing a piano, no? Of course the tunes could have been played higher up as well.

Er, which way are you facing, exactly?
{Hey, who pinched my mirror?)



Stephen

Said Hugh to his lady in red;
I speak of subjects unsaid.
I like how your toes
shake gently at close,
whenever we two are abed.

Les



Post Edited (10-13-04 14:03)

I believe he's catching it on the instant replay.

pam

thx especially to pam helped me alot :)

I have an English Essay to write on the Poem "A Prayer for my Son"
In reading the poem, I read it as a biblical poem, Joseph praying for his son Jesus, if this at all correct? Or am I way of the mark?

Yeats's son William Michael Yeats was born in 1921. He also wrote A Prayer For My Daughter.

[www.cs.rice.edu]


Bid a strong ghost stand at the head
That my Michael may sleep sound,
Nor cry, nor turn in the bed
Till his morning meal come round;
And may departing twilight keep
All dread afar till morning's back.
That his mother may not lack
Her fill of sleep.

Bid the ghost have sword in fist:
Some there are, for I avow
Such devilish things exist,
Who have planned his murder, for they know
Of some most haughty deed or thought
That waits upon his future days,
And would through hatred of the bays
Bring that to nought.

Though You can fashion everything
From nothing every day, and teach
The morning stars to sing,
You have lacked articulate speech
To tell Your simplest want, and known,
Wailing upon a woman's knee,
All of that worst ignominy
Of flesh and bone;

And when through all the town there ran
The servants of Your enemy,
A woman and a man,
Unless the Holy Writings lie,
Hurried through the smooth and rough
And through the fertile and waste,
protecting, till the danger past,
With human love.

Ginny, a poem can have different meanings at different levels, and can be validly interpreted different ways by different readers. So I'm not going to say that your interpretation of "A Prayer For My Son" is incorrect (or correct). I can only offer you my own reading of it, without claiming any authority.

Since the poem refers to 'my Michael', and since Yeats did have a son so named, and since he also wrote a prayer poem for his daughter, I am content to presume "A Prayer For My Son" is principally about his actual son, and is not a coded description of Joseph praying for Jesus.

Yeats projects on his son a certain archetypal character as innocent babe beset by future dangers and threats. At that level alone the poem has resonances with other such stories, including the biblical story.

By the third stanza however, it becomes clear that the poem, though about his son, is a prayer addressed to some deity (referred to with the upper-case 'You' and 'Your') who can command the protective 'strong ghost', and who has all power of creation ('... can fashion everything/From nothing every day'), but who has also experienced the inarticulate helplessness and dependence of infancy. Thus I read the whole poem as invoking the biblical Trinity - father, son and holy ghost.

The description in the fourth stanza of

'A woman and a man ...[who] ...
Hurried through the smooth and rough
And through the fertile and waste,
protecting, till the danger past...'

can be interpreted as referring to Joseph and Mary saving the baby Jesus from murder by Herod's men, even though the St Matthew gospel story (if that's what's meant by 'the Holy Writings') does not, so far as I can recall, specifically mention things smooth or rough or fertile or waste.

The final line, recalling that the deity as an infant was thus saved from danger by human love, seems designed to entreat a return favour from the deity with respect to Yeats' son.

Was Yeats' son really in any comparable danger? I don't know. It isn't difficult for a father to imagine future dangers. I don't understand the reference in the second stanza to 'hatred of the bays'. Maybe someone who is a scholar of Yeats' work can explain that.



Post Edited (10-30-04 11:54)

>'hatred of the bays'

The Century Dictionary offered a whole great big bunch of different meanings for 'bay', none of which was particularly compelling. Perhaps your short Oxford may suggest something?

[www.global-language.com]

Still, one of the Century's definitions referred to 'laurel tree', a term which appears in the daughter poem.

>Ceremony's a name for the rich horn,
>And custom for the spreading laurel tree.

So, hatred of the bays equates to a hatred of customs? Possible but, as I say, not compelling.

Given that bay laurel is used for laurel wreathes, could hatred of the bays be a dislike of conspicuous noble deeds? Such as those refered to in the prevous two lines.



Post Edited (10-30-04 15:33)

The Shorter Oxford doesn't add anything new to explain 'hatred of the bays'.

My initial guess was that it meant some enmity against the folk living in the Sligo Bay/Donegal Bay region; but that wouldn't make any historical sense that I'm aware of. The poem was published in 'The Tower' in 1928.

Googling Yeats with 'bay' or bays' or 'laurel' doesn't help either. It seems he didn't use those words much at all in his poetry. Moreover, in his 'News For The Delphic' there are the lines:

Until in some cliff-sheltered bay
Where wades the choir of love
Proffering its sacred laurel leaves

Those just compound the puzzle by mentioning in the same sentence both a geographic bay and an arboreal bay [laurel tree]! I doubt Yeats had punning in mind.

He was surely too skilled a poet to let the need for a rhyme force him into obscurity or artificiality.

So, for 'A Prayer For My Son', until some Yeats scholar can give a better answer, we are left with a choice between Linda's and Hugh's hypotheses, neither of which is as compelling as one would like.

Either he called a laurel wreath honouring some noble achievement a 'bay', and took it for granted his readers did likewise, or else he used 'bay' as a synonym for laurel tree and assumed that his readers would understand that. I lean towards the latter, as it does seem from his 'Prayer For My Daughter' that he regarded laurel trees as symbolising stability and tradition.

My copy of SOD does give bay as "a wreath for a conqueror or poet, and hence fig. the fame attained by these."

So now I'm leaning your way, Linda!

I missed it in the fine print, though my 1993 edition of the SOD isn't as explicit as yours on the figurative meaning. It gives, as no.3 in the grouped botanical meanings of noun 'bay': "sing. & (usu.) in pl. Leaves or twigs of bay, esp. as a wreath for a conqueror or poet; fig. fame. M16."

It's that bit about 'usually in the plural' that has me almost convinced.

Mine's the 1970 reprint of the 3rd edition, 1944, revised with addenda. Prize for losing the semi-final of University Challenge 1972.

Makes sense that way, as a laurel wreath, I mean. With that in mind, other dictionaries agree. I must have missed it the first time through, looking for the singular instead of the plural:

bay (ba) noun

1.See laurel.
2.Any of certain other trees or shrubs with aromatic foliage, such as the California laurel.
3.A crown or wreath made especially of the leaves and branches of the laurel and given as a sign of honor or victory.
4.Often bays (ba) Honor; renown.

Synonyms -

badge: badge of merit, length of service pin, laurels, bays, wreath, chaplet, garland, trophy
trophy: bays, laurels, the laurel and the rose, crown, laurel crown, bay crown, coronal, chaplet, garland, wreath, palm, palm of victory
honors: laurels, bays, wreath, garland, favor