“All things fall and are built again” murmurs the speaker of William Butler Yeats’s poem, Lapis Lazuli. The faceless speaker, when met with the contention that art is useless in the face of harsh and cold reality, declares that not only is art necessary, but also that artists themselves maintain the very subsistence of the world. By arguing that the nature of life depends on the revitalizing works of the artist, the speaker posits that a cycle of both creation and destruction sustains the existence of all things.
The first stanza of “Lapis Lazuli” sets up the scene for the rest of the poem. The speaker shares a scene of “hysterical women” who scorn “the palette,” “fiddle-bow,” and “poets that are always gay,” claiming that they ignore what “everyone knows,” that is, imminent warfare in the form of airplanes and bomb-dropping zeppelins. The three artistic images that the women reference refer to painters, musicians, and writers, and, by claiming the artisans’ ignorance through their comparison to the common knowledge of war, the women assert that men of art engage only in frivolities that have nothing to do with preventing tragedy in life. The women infer that, if all men are “always gay,” or blissfully ignorant, then all will be utterly destroyed. The speaker, by using the phrase “[p]itch like King Billy,” references the Irish Nationalist insult for Irish Unionists, therefore establishing the Irish fight for independence from England as a metaphor for inevitable destruction.
In the poem’s second stanza, the speaker introduces his theory of the cycle of creation- destruction. He declares that:
“The third stanza presents an example of the cycle of creation-destruction. The speaker details multiple modes of transportation by which newcomers arrive in the wake of “old civilizations put to sword,” representing creation with travel. Inevitably, these newcomers pass away as well, “they and their wisdom [going] to rack,” completing the cycle of creation-destruction. The speaker hammers home the process’s cyclical nature by stating that
The fourth stanza offers the introduction of such an artist. The speaker describes a piece of lapis lazuli carved in the shape of three Chinamen. Above the men “flies a long-legged bird, / a symbol of longevity,” or a crane. One of the men, a servant, holds a nameless musical instrument. The crane is iconic of long life but not of immortality, underscoring the inescapability of death. The instrument remains unidentified because its importance lies not in its name but its function as the medium of an artist. The servant demonstrates his purpose before long.
The fifth stanza expounds a complete rebuttal of the allegations made at the beginning of the poem. The stanza opens with a romantic description of the lapis lazuli carving, pronouncing that even through “discoloration,” “accidental crack or dent,” its flaws find harmony in a series of natural images. By claiming both the beautiful and the ugly aspects of the carving, the speaker highlights the inherent and genuine nature of the creation-destruction cycle as all-encompassing. The speaker “delights” in the Chinamen’s view of “the mountain and the sky” as a meeting of the Earth and heaven, lending to a celestial quality of the cycle as well. He notes that “[o]n all the tragic scene they stare” with “ancient glittering eyes” that are “gay” as the servant begins to play a “mournful tune” on his instrument, fulfilling the role of the hysterical women’s scorned fiddle-bow. This entire scene represents the destruction of civilization by comparing it again to a tragedy’s drop-scene and emphasizing both the musician’s presence and the Chinamen’s gaiety. As artists attend the destruction half of the cycle, they exist to usher in creation — a rebirth colored not by earsplitting explosions and roaring engines but by a serene dirge and a quiet tranquility.
William Butler Yeats’s poem Lapis Lazuli details the necessity of artists and the existence of a cyclical process of creation and destruction. The speaker lends power to his stance by presenting a potent counterpoint in the form of a metaphor and then successfully refuting it with careful examples and vivid imagery. He employs the tools of his three key artists to aid his case: as the painter, evocative description; as the musician, the medium of instruments; as the writer, crucial analogy. Even the poem itself demonstrates a cyclic nature — it presents the initial accusation and, in the end, comes full circle.
