ABSTRACT
Date of composition. The poem was probably written in May 1910, though it is possible that it was not composed before Aug. The version in WBY's Journal (see Textual history) was probably entered there in Aug. 1910, but it is the third in a series of poems that WBY might well have been bringing into shape with an eye to preparing copy for GH10: the poet was already promising ECY copy for the Cuala book at the beginning of Jul. 1910 (see CL 5, 837), and the press completed work on 30 Sept. (GH10 was publ. 23 Nov.), so early Aug. seems a likely time for WBY to be finalizing the texts of his poems. If the poem was, then, finished by WBY in Aug., there is still evidence that most of the composition had taken place in May: it is known that WBY was writing lyric poetry at Colleville in Normandy then, and a date of ‘May, 1910’ is assigned to the poem in the carbon TS NLI 30166, a list of poems with dates prepared for R. Ellmann by GY (and used by him for Identity). It may be that, in critical terms, there is some need to decide whether the poem was composed in MG's company in France (May) or as AG's guest at Coole (Aug.); but firm evidence to resolve this is lacking. Speculatively, it may be suggested that had WBY worked on the poem at Coole, there would be a good chance of AG's having preserved some hol. fair copy or draft, or a TS; but instead, what entered the Coole archive was an inscription of the poem by WBY in AG's copy of CWVP08 vol. 1. If the inscription was made in Aug. 1910 (as seems possible), the poem was already by then in very nearly its finished state, substantial composition having taken place elsewhere, and probably in May.
