Sailing to Byzantium - W.B. Yeats
A Lyrical Exploration of Aging and Transcendence
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees—
Those dying generations—at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God's holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.
W.B. Yeats’s poem “Sailing to Byzantium” reveals the speaker’s quest to transcend the physical confines of aging and the sensual distractions of youth. He contrasts a land brimming with natural life—where “fish, flesh, or fowl” flourish—with the pursuit of spiritual or artistic permanence. The poem’s central symbol, Byzantium, stands for a realm of perfected artistry and divine insight, a place in which mortal limitations might be shed.
Yeats uses vivid imagery to convey the tension between the frailty of an aging body (“An aged man is but a paltry thing”) and the soul’s capacity for creative renewal. The speaker calls upon sages depicted in “gold mosaic,” envisioning them as spiritual guides who can initiate a transformation of the heart, allowing him to inhabit a timeless, art-infused existence.
Ultimately, the poem elevates art as a vehicle for immortality: once the speaker is “out of nature,” he hopes to take on a form like a crafted golden bird singing everlasting truths. This imagined metamorphosis resonates with Yeats’s lifelong fascination with the interplay between worldly decay and the eternal realm of artistic and spiritual creation. In underlining the power of art to grant a measure of eternity, the poem simultaneously confronts the inevitability of aging and the human longing for transcendence.
Key points
1. Yeats contrasts earthly, sensual life with a timeless realm of artistic and spiritual fulfillment.
2. Byzantium symbolizes an ideal of transcendent art free from mortal decay.
3. The poem highlights the tension between the aging body and the soul’s yearning for renewal.
4. Art is portrayed as a route toward spiritual immortality.