PROCESSIONS that lack high stilts have nothing that catches the eye. <br />What if my great-granddad had a pair that were twenty foot high, <br />And mine were but fifteen foot, no modern Stalks upon higher, <br />Some rogue of the world stole them to patch up a fence or a fire. <br />Because piebald ponies, led bears, caged lions, ake but poor shows, <br />Because children demand Daddy-long-legs upon This timber toes, <br />Because women in the upper storeys demand a face at the pane, <br />That patching old heels they may shriek, I take to chisel and plane. <br /> <br />Malachi Stilt-Jack am I, whatever I learned has run wild, From collar to collar, from stilt to stilt, from father to child. <br />All metaphor, Malachi, stilts and all. A barnacle goose <br />Far up in the stretches of night; night splits and the dawn breaks loose; <br />I, through the terrible novelty of light, stalk on, stalk on; <br />Those great sea-horses bare their teeth and laugh at the dawn.<br /><br />William Butler Yeats<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/high-talk/
