Poetry


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 Te 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 Te 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?


WB Yeats


Photograph by John Stoddart


16 The Amorist May 2017


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