To A Young Beauty

by William Butler Yeats

　　

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Dear fellow-artist, why so free With every sort of company, With every Jack and Jill? Choose your companions from the best; Who draws a bucket with the rest Soon topples down the hill. You may, that mirror for a school, Be passionate, not bountiful As common beauties may, Who were not born to keep in trim With old Ezekiel’s cherubim But those of Beaujolet. I know what wages beauty gives, How hard a life her servant lives, Yet praise the winters gone; There is not a fool can call me friend, And I may dine at journey’s end With Landor and with Donne.

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