The Rose Tree (poem)

The Rose Tree is a poem by William Butler Yeats. ^[1] It was published in 1921 as part of his collection Michael Robartes and the Dancer .

Synopsis

It describes a fictional conversation between James Connolly and Patrick Pearse, the leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising. First, Pearse says that a "breath of politic words" or a "wind that blows / across the bitter sea" (Britain ^[2] ) might have withered their "Rose Tree," or, Ireland. ^[3] Connolly replies that the tree "needs to be but watered." Pearse then says that "all the wells are parched away," and argues for the necessity of blood sacrifice, ^{[1] [4]} saying that only their "own red blood / can make a right Rose Tree".

Background

The description of Ireland symbolised as a tree that needs to be watered, and of the necessity of bloodshed for its protection, is likely to be influenced by the ballad "Ireland's Liberty Tree" ^[3] that ends with the lines:

Let each son of Erin contribute
  Whate'er in his power doth lie;
The pure blood of Ireland's Martyrs
  Gave it strength, and it shall never die.
Then gather beneath its broad branches,
  All ye who dare strive to be free,
And Heaven will surely protect those
  Who guard Ireland's Liberty-Tree!

References

1. Sinha, M. P. (2003). W. B. Yeats: His Poetry And Politics. Atlantic Publishers & Dist. p. 105. ISBN   978-81-269-0300-9.
2. Nishitani, Mariko (31 March 2014). "Development in Yeats's Use of the Refrain in Ballads and Folk Songs in "Beggar to Beggar Cried," "The Rose Tree,"and "Three Things". Zephyr. 26: 1–18. doi:10.14989/189398. ISSN   0919-3146.
3. Jeffares, A. Norman (18 June 1968). A Commentary on the Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats. Springer. p. 230. ISBN   978-1-349-00163-7.
4. Brearton, Fran; Gillis, Alan (25 October 2012). The Oxford Handbook of Modern Irish Poetry. OUP Oxford. ISBN   978-0-19-956124-7.

External links

• The collected public domain poetry of Yeats as an eBook at Standard Ebooks