Leda And The Swan
A
EN blow: the great wings beating
Above the staggering girl, her thighs
By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill,
He holds her helpless breast upon his breast.
How can those terrified vague fingers
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
The broken wall, the burning roof and
And Agamemnon dead.
Being so caught up,
So mastered by the brute blood of the air,
Did she put on his knowledge with his
Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?
The original print of this piece (Dial,
June 1924) had these lines lines 1 - 4A rush, a sudden wheel, and hovering
The bird descends, and her frail thighs are pressed.
By the webbed toes, and that all-powerful
Has laid her helpless face upon his breast.lines 6 -
The feathered glory from her loosening thighs! (the question mark was later replaced with an exclamation mark,
The Tower 1928) All the stretched body's laid on the white
And feels the strange heart beating where it lies;
William Butler Yeats
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