He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven
By: William Butler Yeats
Enwrought with golden and silver light, 2
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths 3
Of night and light and the half-light, 4
I would spread the cloths under your feet: 5
But I, being poor, have only my dreams; 6
I have spread my dreams under your feet; 7
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams. 8
Theme: Generosity
Epistrophe: Repetition of the ends of two or more successive sentences, verses, etc.
Example Two: The phrase "under your feet" is repeated lines five and seven because Butler is showing that since the clothes are spread so are the dreams; the dreams are the most valuable thing can the loved one can have and the poet is comparing them to the cloths from heaven because those would be extremely valued also.
Example Three: The poet repeats the section "my dreams" in lines six and eight because the poet wants to emphasize that the poet is indeed pushing his dreamed on his loved one but by doing that the loved one is creating their own dreams to reach; this is ultimately what the poet wants,
Symbol: An object or action that means more than its literally meaning
Example Two: When the poet writes about spreading cloths and dreams under feet it is actually symbolism (found in lines five and seven). The poet is not actually spreading anything under anyone's feet but is explaining that he is giving someone dreams and helping to inspire them.
Example Three: Line four "of night and light and half lit" represents symbolism because the poet is trying to portray that he is constantly working every single day on inspiring others and sharing his dreams of giving everyone else their own dreams to work for.
Apostrophe: an address to a person absent or dead or to an abstract identity
Example Two: Found in lines five, seven, and eight are the words "your" and "you" which are also abstract identities, making it an apostrophe, because the reader could interpret the poem in many different ways. The reader could think when the poet says "you" or "your" that he is talking directly to the reader, or the reader could think of the "you" as someone the poet knows and cares about.
Example Three: The last apostrophe can be found in line one when the poet writes about the heavens. Because the reader is not aware of the poet's religion it's impossible to differentiate who and what the heavens are. They, or the place, could be interpreted as a Christian Heaven with only God but also as an infinite amount of other religions; like a Buddhist God or multiple Roman and Greek Gods are examples of such.