Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
First, the title. One might think that an Irish Catholic would be referring to the second coming of Christ. However, what we know of Yeats is that he was not religious, was more of a modernist and today might be considered a humanist. Furthermore, he offers in the second stanza a quite varied vision, not one in which Christ returns and we are redeemed, rather a ‘rough beast’ to bring some unknown future.
“Turning and turning…”, the poem opens with a vision of a ‘widening gyre’ or spiral that instead of funneling downward is spiraling upward and outward, more like a tornado Yeats likens this to the falcon which, on the hunt, flies in ever-expanding circles with its keen eyes scoping and surveying the ground in search of prey yet always alert to the instructions of the falconer. Yet, in Yeats world the gyre is, thusly, out of control., such that the falcon that is so distant can no longer see or hear the falconer. The partnership has been severed.
Why? This vision of upheaval and chaos reflected the world Yeat’s lived in ‘reeling’ out of control (a usage that will repeat itself later in the poem), what with the final end of the most destructive war in the history of man; Irish uprisings; Europe in conflagration and splintering apart. He saw the world as not able to get worse - all relationships among man were crumbling and systems and institutions were falling apart. Lawlessness and destruction and a tidal wave of blood and coagulation have settled in. And thus, “the center will not hold”, that finite point around which the spiral circles and holds fixed becomes weakened and the internal structure begins to crumble. This term was repeated in the military to describe how, if the flanks begin to weaken, the center’s hold of powerful forces will eventually be ripped apart.
And, in the midst of all this bloody calamity, without leadership, cohesion, or any sense of binding principle, all opposition, for good or for evil, is meaningless…and “mere” [total] anarchy is “loosed” or unleashed upon the world. “Innocence is drowned” [positioned nicely here following ‘tide’ in the previous sentence) in the din of upheaval. And, then in one of the greatest lines ever in all of poetry, “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.” We surely witness this today as violent fervor spreads just like the virus laying in wait in the background of our lives. It may be true that intensity can be a disguise for conviction, but in the end it is the passionate who prevail. Maybe because the ‘best’ or good people become despondent and near giving up. And, evil can be a passion. Because evil doers love the terror and chaos and are striven to and hungry for power. While the good do nothing.
All this is precursor. And, Yeats, cleverly uses the instinctive analogy of Biblical revelation and the Second Coming. But, he quickly instructs us that he is dubious about the whole thing. He begins the first two sentences of the second stanza with the word “Surely” which can be interpreted as either ‘will definitely happen’ or, more than likely, is a question inferring that things can get hardly worse. The repetition of the word strongly infers his doubt that things will get better. Yeats, uses the word “revelation” as derived from the Greek, its application here referring to an apocalypse and more directly suggestive of an ‘opening’ or re-birth. A new world order. And so he repeats in the beginning of the second stanza. “The Second Coming” imploring us to share with him the “spiritus mundi”, his world-view, a kind of universal consciousness or collective unconscious (influenced by Carl Jung?). But, be aware, this world “troubles my sight” and is both creative and destructive, with barren wastelands and beasts coming to life whose expressions are empty and lacking empathy or condolence, like the blank stare of the sun.
This imagery is made more ominous with the allusion to the desert, both barren and lifeless. Added to which, flying about are “desert birds” or vultures circling awaiting ‘death’. What is dying? Humanity? Civilization? Reason? Suddenly, Yeats declares ‘enough already’ when “The darkness drops again” and some power of knowing that has slept for “twenty centuries” or two thousand years has been vexed and will awaken (again a reference to Christ born in a cradle around this time). But, what is awakening is a “rough beast”. Not Christ? Or Christ vexed and annoyed at what we have made of this world? Or, possbily the anti-Christ (Satan?), for his time has come…”at last”.
Finally, we see the beast “slouching” and creature-like posture. I feel this infers a return to earlier forms of human existence. In any case, it i “slouching to Bethlehem” the birthplace of Christ, again suggesting and alluding to a second coming “to be born. Yeats, does not seem to be promoting the Christian idea of being ‘saved’ or of ‘heaven’ as reward, but a re-birth that may give man another chance…or not. I sense he is leaving to the reader to determine what humanity deserves.
My sense is that if Yeats lived today hardly a word to this most extraordinary poem would need to be changed. This has been a labor of love. Mine is a singular attempt to attack and understand this poem. There are infinite ways to understand this poem for yourselves. If you are interested in sharing some of those ideas I would welcome them.
