This is a clip from the Other Voices New York City video in 2011.

Gabriel Byrne and Martin Hayes perform “Down By The Salley Gardens,” the beloved poem by William Butler Yeats.

Down by the salley gardens my love and I did meet;
She passed the salley gardens with little snow-white feet.
She bid me take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree;
But I, being young and foolish, with her would not agree.

In a field by the river my love and I did stand,
And on my leaning shoulder she laid her snow-white hand.
She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs;
But I was young and foolish, and now am full of tears.

Be sure to read more about the Other Voices event held in New York City in 2011!

2 Comments

  1. Listening to this make me cry.
    It is so full of emotions.

    • Me too, Nora. Makes me cry every time. I get the sense that he is being unsentimental in this reading, but it does not matter. He invokes the waterworks anyway!

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