16 Sep: "Leda and the Swan" by W.B. Yeats

Leda and the Swan

A sudden blow: the great wings beating still
Above the staggering girl, her thighs caressed
By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill,
He holds her helpless breast upon his breast.

How can those terrified vague fingers push
The feathered glory from her loosening thighs?
And how can body, laid in that white rush,
But feel the strange heart beating where it lies?

A shudder in the loins engenders there
The broken wall, the burning roof and tower
And Agamemnon dead.
                    Being so caught up,
So mastered by the brute blood of the air,
Did she put on his knowledge with his power
Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?

1 comment:

  1. It appears that a girl is being very much attacked by a swan and the narrator is a simple bystander who does not or is not able to offer any such help. I am unsure what the metaphor offers here and the reference to Agamemnon (my Greek mythology is severely lacking in depth....). I looked up "engenders": cause or give rise to (a feeling, situation, or condition). The question mark at the end should tell us something great, but again, I don't understand the metaphor.

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