When You Are Old by William Butler Yeats

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

How many loved your moments of glad grace,
And loved your beauty with love false or true,
But one man loved the pilgrim Soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face;

And bending down beside the glowing bars,
Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.
~William Butler Yeats

William Butler Yeats lived from 1865 to 1939, and was famous for being an Irish poet and dramatist. He's also considered to be one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. He also helped found the Abbey Theatre along with Lady Gregory and Edward Martyn. Yeats was also a driving force behind the Irish Literary Revival.

I believe Yeats may be true in this poem about old age - he himself was old when he had written it, so he'd have a good understanding of what being old felt like. What was really interesting was how he capitalized the first letter in the word "love" the third verse, so that it came out as an important word or a real person. You can also see this in the Declaration of Independence, where Thomas Jefferson had capitalized many words that he possibly considered of high importance in their message to the King. Yeats may have been trying to say that love, or the feeling of love, had left the old person and gone away in that the person didn't feel love anymore. By doing this Yeats created an important theme in the poem, and was therefore not just about having problems when you become old but also how your emotions and personality is changed as well.