On the grey rock of Cashel I suddenly saw

A Sphinx with woman breast and lion paw,

A Buddha, hand at rest,

Hand lifted up that blest;

And right between these two a girl at play

That it may be had danced her life away,

For now being dead it seemed

That she of dancing dreamed.

Although I saw it all in the mind's eye

There can be nothing solider till I die;

I saw by the moon's light

Now at its fifteenth night.

One lashed her tail; her eyes lit by the moon

Gazed upon all things known, all things unknown,

In triumph of intellect

With motionless head erect.

That other's moonlit eyeballs never moved,

Being fixed on all things loved, all things unloved,

Yet little peace he had

For those that love are sad.

Oh, little did they care who danced between,

And little she by whom her dance was seen

So that she danced. No thought,

Body perfection brought,

For what but eye and ear silence the mind

With the minute particulars of mankind?

Mind moved yet seemed to stop

As 'twere a spinning-top.

In contemplation had those three so wrought

Upon a moment, and so stretched it out

That they, time overthrown,

Were dead yet flesh and bone.