Read the excerpt. “When You Are Old” by William Butler Yeats When you are old and gray and full of sleep, And nodding by the fir
e, take down this book, And slowly read, and dream of 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. What assumption about the woman’s life does the speaker make in “When You Are Old”? She has never known his love because she did not choose him. She is no longer beautiful because she has aged. She is ready to accept his love now that she is older. She has remained alone her whole life because no one ever loved her.
The author literally asks that when she is old, wrinkled and gray, she takes the book, reads and remembers the belaza they had when she was young. The part of the text that makes this clear is:
<em>"...take down this book, And slowly read, and dream of 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..."</em>
