Saturday, June 13, 2015

W.B Yeats 150th Birthday Celebrations . Drumcliff, Lissadell

Today Ireland and more specicifically Sligo, Drumcliff and Lissadell celebrated this great poets life on his 150th birthday. 
Below I will link videos to Lissadell and Drumcliff.

William Butler Yeats is buried at Drumcliff graveyard. Simple and beautiful words cover his gravestone "Cast a cold Eye On life , On Death . Horseman Pass By. 
A single rose lay there today. The graveyard is surrounded by trees and other graves some new but mostly old and in various stages of disrepair , this manages to add to the charm of this small place filled with huge charm and overlooked by Benbulben mountain behind it which Yeats himself always wrote about so lovingly . Born 13th June 1865, died January 28th 1939.

Yeats had strong connections to Lissadell house where he stayed from time to time and enjoyed friendship with past residents of the house and had a crush on some of the ladies from the information I have found through the years. 




He found great inspiration at Lissadell and wrote about his friendships with some of the females in the house in his poem : In Memory of Eva Gore- Booth and Con Markievicz.
Ireland is very proud of this poet and rightly so as he found so much beauty here and wrote what he saw , be it good or bad ,and shared it with the world .
I have visited his graveyard often as I often pass it , and in the autumn when the leaves have turned golden colours and it is quiet and peaceful there I can see why he loved this area so much, Benbulben towers behind the church and as you walk around it you can't help but see the beauty of the place. 
After Drumcliff I was off to Lissadell and Lissadell house. 
Stephen James
Art Exhibits 
The beautiful walk back from the house
Beautiful Lissadell 

There was a lot of celebrating here today with live music, food, art exhibits ,horse drawn carriages, and for me my favourite moments were listening to Senator David Norris, Anne Doyle, Bryan Dobson,Paddy Clancy, Maurice P Gaffney, Marian Richardson, Mary Wilson, Dr Declan Collinge, Ambassador Dan Mulhall, Archana, daughter of the Indian Ambassador Mrs Radhika Lal Lokesh. Many poems were read to an eager audience and a hush fell over the crowd as each poem was read and enjoyed . My personal favourites are "He wishes for the Cloths of a Heaven " and " When You Are Old"  , but to be fair there is beauty and humour and often painful honesty in his poetry that I can't help but love. 
Yeats Grave

Live at Lissadell, the singer Stephen James

Live at Lissadell , Singer Stephen James

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