Those Dancing Days Are Gone

I used to love, love this poem by William Butler Yeats back in Secondary school and have only recently discovered that it had been made into a song by the French-Italian Carla Bruni .

She's a wonderful french folk singer song-writer, who is not only talented, beautiful and poised, but is also now the First Lady of France.





Come, let me sing into your ear;
Those dancing days are gone,
All that silk and satin gear;
Crouch upon a stone,
Wrapping that foul body upIn as foul a rag:
I carry the sun in a golden cup.
The moon in a silver bag.

Curse as you may I sing it through;
What matter if the knave That the most could pleasure you,
The children that he gave,
Are somewhere sleeping like a top
Under a marble flag?
I carry the sun in a golden cup.
The moon in a silver bag.

I thought it out this very day.
Noon upon the clock,
A man may put pretence away
Who leans upon a stick,
May sing, and sing until he drop,
Whether to maid or hag:
I carry the sun in a golden cup,
The moon in a silver bag.

- William B. Yeats