Another Song of a Fool

This great purple butterfly,

In the prison of my hands,

Has a learning in his eye

Not a poor fool understands.

5

Once he lived a schoolmaster

With a stark, denying look,

A string of scholars went in fear

Of his great birch and his great book.

Like the clangour of a bell,

10

Sweet and harsh, harsh and sweet,

That is how he learnt so well

To take the roses for his meat.

—
William Butler Yeats

The Wild Swans at Coole, 1919