Time & Brevity
The Old Men Admiring Themselves in the Water
From In the Seven Woods (1903)
Time & Brevity
I heard the old, old men say
'Everything alters,
And one by one we drop away.'
They had hands like claws, and their knees
Were twisted like the old thorn trees
By the waters.
I heard the old, old men say
'All that's beautiful drifts away
Like the waters.'
Cite this poem
MLA
Yeats, W. B. “The Old Men Admiring Themselves in the Water.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/yeats/81/.
Chicago
Yeats, W. B. “The Old Men Admiring Themselves in the Water.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/yeats/81/.
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