I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
and a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;
Nine bean-rows will I have there, and a hive for the honeybee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.
And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.
I will arise and go now, for always night and day,
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore.
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.
William Butler Yeats wrote "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" about a place that lived partly in memory and partly in imagination, an island he thought of as an idyll and a refuge. This past week, I found myself thinking about my own Innisfree and dreaming of planting my own bean-rows, of living very simply in a little cottage with some hens and lots of time to paint and write and play music, to be amongst the leaves and grasses and water. The pictures are from two places, one of which I know better than the other, but both of which feel very much like home.
Where is your "Innisfree?"
What poem would you illustrate with your photos?
