Read "The Old Age of Queen Maeve" by W.B. Yeats online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Maeve the great queen was pacing to and fro, / Between the walls covered with beaten bronze, / In her high house at Cruachan; the long hearth, / Flickering with ash and hazel, but half showed / Where the tired horse-boys lay upon the rushes, / Or on the benches underneath the walls, / In comfortable sleep; all living slept / But that great queen, who more than half the night / Had paced from door to fire and fire to door.
Though now in her old age, in her young age / She had been beautiful in that old way / That's all but gone; for the proud heart is gone / And the fool heart of the counting-house fears all / But soft beauty and indolent desire.