A Deep-sworn Vow

A Deep-sworn Vow is my favorite poem from W. B. Yeats (at least from the ones I have read) and probably I like it because it shows a contrast between two states of mind, the conscious state that believes he has forgotten the loved one and the other state, the unconscious, that refuses to do so.

The unforgettable image of the person still remains somewhere deep within him, and the image is brought back “suddenly” from the unconscious mind to the conscious mind. As we know, this poem is related to the feelings of Yeats about a love affair that occurred many years ago, since other relationships have taken its place. Yeats met Maud Gonne when he was 23-year-old and he really fell in love of her because he proposed four times to Gonne, but she always rejected him. Gonne had such a significant and lasting effect on his poetry and his life thereafter (as we can see in this poem).

In A Deep-sworn Vow Yeats brings back to him the loved one's image in three instances. For example, “When I look death in the face” means that when he might be in great danger he unconsciously remembers the loved one. “When I clamber to the heights of sleep” (while sleeping the sub-conscious mind appears and he remembers in his dreams the loved one) and “when I grow excited with wine” in trivial moments when he is in company he still remembers the loved one.

I personally believe that in this few lines Yeats expresses this personal and intimate feelings to the reader, and he creates a deep relationship among readers and himself becoming his personal and utterly feelings of a love affair into beautiful lines that can be individualized for each reader.