American Family in Longford: W.B. Yeat's Grave in County Sligo

This is a protestant churchyard in Drumcliff, County Sligo. W. B. Yeats died in France on January 28, 1939. He wanted a quick, quiet burial in France, and then after some time would pass, he asked that he be dug up and "planted" in Sligo. His body was exhumed and buried here in September 1948. The final stanza of his last poem states where he was to be buried and his epitaph:

Under Ben Bulben (last verse of the poem)

"Under bare Ben Bulben’s head
In Drumcliff churchyard Yeats is laid.
An ancestor was rector there
Long years ago, a church stands near,
By the road an ancient cross.
No marble, no conventional phrase;
On limestone quarried near the spot
By his command these words are cut:

Cast a cold eye
On life, on death.
Horseman, pass by!”

Georgie Hyde-Lees became his wife when he was 51 years old. She is buried here with Yeats. Prior to marrying George, Yeats proposed to Maud Gonne 4 times, and she turned him down each time. Instead she married John Macbride, a revolutionary who was executed by the British as a result of his actions in the Easter Rising of 1916. Yeats proposed to Maud one last time after she was widowed, but again she turned him down. Thereafter he married George and they had 2 children together. Yeats was 27 years older than her.

I do not know a lot about W. B. Yeats, but as a result of being here and of seeking out graves for Laurie, I have started reading more about him. He was a very interesting person, with a different religious and political perspective than many Irish Nationalists of the time. He was not a revolutionary per se, but did support the cause of Irish freedom. He was vocal about politics and about Irish Independence. He pushed for Irish plays, Irish writing, and Irish actors in collaborating with other writers to establish the Abbey Theater in Dublin in 1899. He is worth reading about if one is interested in Irish Literature, History and Theater and he is a case in point for the argument that the battle for Irish Independence was not a simple divide along Catholic and Protestant lines.

Ben Bulben is the mountain that stands over Drumcliffe. I could not capture it because the day we were there it was shrouded in mist. I would encourage looking up images of it online. It is a long, flat-topped mountain with a dramatic beauty. I can see why he chose the sight for his final resting place. There are hiking paths on the mountain, but I have not yet attempted it. It is supposed to be quite walkable, but it can also be dangerous and people have suffered fatal injuries falling from the mountain.

I loved this statue of Yeats and his poem, "He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven" engraved there:

HAD I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.