Don’t laugh too soon, the poet may be laughing at YOU!

                                   

                                      

 

 

                                          Beggar to Beggar Cried         W.B. Yeats

 

 

“Time to put off the world and go somewhere

And find my health again in the sea air,”

Beggar to beggar cried, being frenzy-struck,

“And make my soul before my pate is bare.”

 

“And get a comfortable wife and house

To rid me of the devil in my shoes,”

Beggar to beggar cried, being frenzy-struck,

“And the worse devil that is between my thighs.”

 

“And though I’d marry with a comely lass,

She need not be too comely–let it pass,”

Beggar to beggar cried, being frenzy-struck,

“But there’s a devil in a looking-glass.”

 

“Nor should she be too rich, because the rich

Are driven by wealth as beggars by the itch,”

Beggar to beggar cried, being frenzy-struck,

“And cannot have a humorous happy speech,”

 

“And there I’ll grow respected at my ease,

and hear amid the garden’s nightly peace,”

Beggar to beggar cried, being frenzy-struck,

“The wind-blown clamour of the barnacle-geese.”

 

 

A harmoniously, hideously, hilariously humorous poem– absolutely comical to the highest degree!

The poem, re-written in prose form, would probably run like this:

One beggar, struck by his frenzy, cried to another….

 

 

The rest is really quite easy! (Come, Izzy, U shouldn’t rely on Dad to do the translation all the time!)

 

Discussion:

The lines that make one laugh the hardest are probably the following:

   1.           “Time to put off the world and go somewhere

                And find my health again in the sea air,”

 

When a beggar thinks like a millionaire, there is a problem, obviously…

 

2.               “And get a comfortable wife…

                  To rid me of…the worse devil that is between my thighs.”

It seems likely that the poor dude cannot afford a single issue of Playboy to quench his thirst! Imagine the torment he recieves from that “worse devil” that is between his thighs!

 

3.                 ” Nor should she be too rich, because the rich

                      Are driven by wealth as beggars by the itch,”

                     ” And cannot have a humorous happy speech.”

 

Aha! the rich are driven by wealth as beggars by the itch! How true!!!

 

Seriously,when was the last time you saw the First Lady have a humorous happy speech? Each time Laura Bush stands by her man giving that killer “Love George” pose, one fancies W might just as well use a Barbie Doll to proclaim his redneckry and his wretchedly weird cowboy a-la-Texas- style manhood.

 

Folks: now that we have done our share laughing at the beggar,and/or the Commander-in-Chief, it’s time to think again!

Yeats might just be laughing at you,–indeed, all of us !

(Are you not stricken by the poverty of the soul?)

In that sense, you can be the target of Yeats’ mirth,too!

 

Ben Taishing