苇间风

“When I wrote these poems I had so meditated over the images that came to me in writing ‘Ballads and Lyrics’, ‘The Rose’, and ‘The Wanderings of Oisin’, and other images from Irish folk-lore, that they had become true symbols. I had sometimes when awake, but more often in sleep, moments of vision, a state very unlike dreaming, when these images took upon themselves what seemed an independent life and became a part of a mystic language, which seemed always as if it would bring me some strange revelation. Being troubled at what was thought a reckless obscurity, I tried to explain myself in lengthy notes, into which I put all the little learning I had, and more wilful phantasy than I now think admirable, though what is most mystical still seems to me the most true”

1899年以单行本形式问世，共收诗三十七首。叶芝原注（1908）说：“在写这些诗的时候，我凝神沉思那些写《谣曲和抒情诗》〔译按：即《十字路》〕、《玫瑰》和《乌辛漫游记》时光临我的意象和其他来自爱尔兰民俗的意象，以至于它们变成了真正的象征。有时在醒着的时候，但更经常是在睡着的时候，我有片刻的幻视，一种与做梦非常不同的状态，其时这些意象自己获得一种类似独立生命的东西，变成一种神秘语言的一部分；这种语言似乎永远会给我带来某种奇异的启示。因可能被认为是轻率的晦涩而不安，我遂试图以冗长的注释自我解释，在其中我放入了我所有的一点点学问，以及我现在认为不太合适的任意幻想，虽然在我看来最神秘的事物仍然是最真实的”（《校刊本》，页800）。古希腊神话传说，阿卡狄亚的山林女神绪任克斯被畜牧神潘追逐，情急之下祈求父亲河神拉冬把她变成芦苇。潘于是用芦苇做成排箫，以纪念所爱（见奥维德《变形记》）。故苇间风亦有吹箫之气息的意思