THE CAP AND BELLS

by: William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)

HE jester walked in the garden:

The garden had fallen still;

He bade his soul rise upward

And stand on her window-sill.

 

It rose in a straight blue garment,

When owls began to call:

It had grown wise-tongued by thinking

Of a quiet and light footfall;

 

But the young queen would not listen;

She rose in her pale night-gown;

She drew in the heavy casement

And pushed the latches down.

 

He bade his heart go to her,

When the owls called out no more;

In a red and quivering garment

It sang to her through the door.

 

It had grown sweet-tongued by dreaming

Of a flutter of flower-like hair;

But she took up her fan from the table

And waved it off on the air.

 

'I have cap and bells,' he pondered,

'I will send them to her and die';

And when the morning whitened

He left them where she went by.

 

She laid them upon her bosom,

Under a cloud of her hair,

And her red lips sang them a love-song

Till stars grew out of the air.

 

She opened her door and her window,

And the heart and the soul came through,

To her right hand came the red one,

To her left hand came the blue.

 

They set up a noise like crickets,

A chattering wise and sweet,

And her hair was a folded flower

And the quiet of love in her feet.

• The Land of Heart's Desire - A synopsis of the play by William Butler Yeats.
• William Butler Yeats - A biography of the Irish poet and dramatist.
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