William Butler
William Butler
Multi-instrumentalist for the band Arcade Fire who plays bass, synth, guitar, and percussion. He has also worked on movie soundtracks, like the one for Her.
ProfessionGuitarist
Date of Birth6 October 1982
delight pebbles heritage
There's keen delight in what we have: The rattle of pebbles on the shore Under the receding wave.
marriage real despair
Maybe the bride-bed brings despair, For each an imagined image brings And finds a real image there....
white ears stones
Do you not hear me calling, white deer with no horns? I have been changed to a hound with one red ear; I have been in the Path of Stones and the Wood of Thorns....
alive lovers
for never yet Has lover lived, but longed to wive Like them that are no more alive.
prayer play two
May we two stand, When we are dead, beyond the setting suns, A little from other shades apart, With mingling hair, and play upon one lute.
goes-on revolution cannons
Hurrah for revolution and cannon come again! The beggars have changed places, but the lash goes on.
swings black green
Your hooves have stamped at the black margin of the wood, Even where horrible green parrots call and swing. My works are all stamped down into the sultry mud.
time fire chairs
My chair was nearest to the fire In every company That talked of love or politics, Ere Time transfigured me.
flames sea white
I am haunted by numberless islands, many a Danaan shore, Where Time would surely forget us, and Sorrow come near us no more;Soon far from the rose and the lily and fret of the flames would we be, Were we only white birds, my beloved, buoyed out on the foam of the sea!
god hatred soul
Thought is a garment and the soul's a bride That cannot in that trash and tinsel hide: Hatred of God may bring the soul to God.
civilization together uprooting
Civilisation is hooped together, brought Under a rule, under the semblance of peace By manifold illusion....
fate men light
I weave the shoes of Sorrow: Soundless shall be the footfall light In all men's ears of Sorrow, Sudden and light.
brilliant youth bitter
Acquaintance; companion; One dear brilliant woman; The best-endowed, the elect, All by their youth undone, All, all, by that inhuman Bitter glory wrecked.
secret difficult known
Be secret and exult, Because of all things known That is most difficult.