This paper addresses the interrelated themes of space and place in the poetry of W.B Yeats and Patrick Kavanagh. It focuses on the idea of place as a physical entity, as outlined, for instance, by Seamus Heaney in his essay “The Sense of Place.” In this essay Heaney talks about the “history of our sensibilities” that looks to the stable element of the land for continuity: “We are dwellers, we are namers, we are lovers, we make homes and search for our histories.” Thus the lyric form seeks to identify place as a site in which identity can be located and defined. But also on a metaphysical level, the interactions of space and place are seen as a liberating site for an exploration of identity, as expressed through poetic language. In this respect, space and place can be viewed in dialectic terms, where in the words of the cultural geographer Yi Fu Tuan, “Place is security, space is freedom.”