Can Poetry Save the Earth?: A Field Guide to Nature Poems

NATURE VERSUS HISTORY IN W. B. YEATS 111

moves deeper than possible into this carved lapis. One man “Carries a musical
instrument,” which is true, but another, we ’re told, “asks for mournful melo-
dies,” and “Their ancient, glittering eyes, are gay.”
Writing his own epitaph, W. B. Yeats turned death into art on the ground
of a long-lived landscape. “Under Ben Bulben” takes its title from a mountain

Lapis lazuli stone, back.

Courtesy of A. P. Watt Ltd. and the National Library of Ireland.