Sailing to Byzantium, William Butler Yeats (비잔티움에로의 항해)

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.

 

 

II

 

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.

 

 

III

 

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.

 

 

IV

 

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.

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- 시인은 당시 나이가 61세, 노인을 위한 나라가 아니라고 소외감을 느끼고 있음

- 사람과 동물은 삶과 죽음이라는 순환에 갇혀 있는 존재들이다

- 지금의 관능과 향락에 빠져서 세월이 가도 바래지 않는 지성의 기념비를 무시한다는 것

- 시간이 가도 변하지 않는 것에 관심이 없는 사람들

- 자신의 몸을 가리켜 thing이라고 표현

- 아일랜드 사람들이 육체적인 관능적인 것에만 관심이 있고 영혼의 기념비에 관심이 없어서 바다를 건너 비잔티움에 왔음

- 시인은 늙어서 자신의 육신을 벗어버리고 새로운 육신을 취하고자 한다

- 이러한 새로운 육신은 영원히 존재하는 것