the deciphering of codes; a poem a month

I am determined to commit to this new project of mine. I will be writing an analysis of one poem every month for the duration of this year, granted that I am exposed to poems that engage and inspire me, I will chose the one that resonated with me the most.

And so I shall be documenting this year in poems. 

The first being: The Song of The Happy Shepherd by William Yeats

I came across this poem when watching the film The Theory of Everything based on the life of the renown physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking. The following line relayed by Jane Hawking had caught my attention: 

New dreams, new dreams; there is no truth

Saving in thine own heart. Seek, then,

No learning from the starry men, 

Who follow with the optic glass 

The whirling ways of stars that pass --- 

Seek, then, for this is also sooth,

Looking at photos of times past, I always find myself thinking how the past seems framed in perfection compared to the present. And so I live seeking- chasing this imaginary state that seems trapped in dimensions limited by time. Like the starry men that Yeats described, I am chasing stars that pass. But that's the thing, in my imagining of the idealistic details that made my life then, I completely ignore the not-so-pleasant details that were (at times) equally present. 

We create these imaginations, these dreams, as a way to romanticize the past so that there is something rooted, and not fleeting, that we can compare our present days to. When I think back to my childhood, the images that come to mind are fazy, light, and filled with nostalgic shine. Even the sun shone differently then- or at least, in mind it did. 

So what lessons can we derive from this poem? In the words of the poet himself: "Seek, then, no learning from the starry men who follow with the optic glass the whirling ways of stars that pass."