The collection of poems "Last Poems" by William Butler Yeast was published posthumously in the year of his death. It contains 57 poems and two plays. The following summary shows the content of two of the most famous poems from this collection. The first one contains the poets own epitaph he wrote for himself and has a sombre feeling, while the second one is joyful and sexual in nature.
Under Ben Bulben
The poem consists of 6 movements with 13 stanzas in total. The first movement urges readers to pledge allegiance to two ethereal concepts, the witch of Atlas (a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley) and spiritual, perfect riders among the hill side of Ben Bulben in Ireland. The second movement soothes the readers mind by evoking a picture of eternal reincarnation. Death is just a short moment till you are reunited with those you love. Death really never happens.
The third movement states, evoking a prayer by Irish patriot John Mitchel that only strive can lead to great deeds and help men become their best self. The only stanza of this movement speaks of violence as a means to reach one’s own fate. The fourth movement speaks of how humanity can reach spiritual insights. The poets and artists of past times showed us how it is done. Yeats list here in five stanza the great artistic works of time gone by, starting with the mathematical genius of Egyptian pyramids, through the paintings of Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel to the paintings of the "Quattrocento" period. The movement ends with a reminder that modern art has left these spiritual paths.
The fifth movement is a patriotic cry to his fellow Irish poets. They should not celebrate the modern ways, but look back at the glorious and aristocratic past. In this way they might preserve the Irish supremacy. The final movement is a clear instruction on how Yeats wants to be buried, by the hills of Ben Bulben and with his own epitaph engraved in his tombstone. The simple three lines "Cast a cold eye, on life, on death, horseman pass by" remind the readers of his tombstone to pursue spiritual perfection in imitation of those horseman they pledged allegiance to at the beginning of the poem.
Politics
The short poem politics invokes a picture of a young girl that has no mind to think about the politics of Europe or the potential war that is to come. The politicians and learned man might be right. In the end, the protagonist of the poem just wants to be young again and hold that girl in his arm.
