The Lake Isle of Innisfree

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee;
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet’s wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,
I hear it in the deep heart’s core.
(1890)

As creatives, we need to have imaginary realms that we can retreat into and do our work. In these places, we can explore the deep heart’s core, and experience the peace it offers. In these places, we retreat into our imagination, and let it roam where it will.

William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) had such a place on the Lake Isle of Innisfree, an uninhabited island within Lough Gill, in Ireland, near which he spent his summers as a child. The memory of the place came to him while walking, at the age of twenty-three, in downtown London. He dreamt of living on the island one day, but never did, never grew beans there. Nevertheless, he could retreat into his memory of that island, its bee-loud glade, where the water lapped gently on the shore, and find the internal world out of which he could create poetry.

What do you do, what imaginary realm do you retreat into, so that you might hear your “deep heart’s core?”