NP: More about annunciation

[Michael Bailey]

well, eck-shually, I do have a few thoughts:

the Kay Smith poem sounds, to me, like she is looking back at a
misspent youth with some regrets.

like, she and her friend had discovered the pleasure in resisting the
beckoning of the angel of conventionality - but if you live long
enough you get to have 2nd thoughts about everything (probably even
Mary sometimes wished she had told the angel to take a hike, like when
she's 9 months pregnant and has to sleep in a stable eg)

a homely analogy is how I used to vigorously resist parental calls for
naptime, and now I would be delighted to have a naptime in the middle
of my shift at work.....

anyway that's how I relate to it.  The bit about Mary holding a book
is interesting, and probably means something, but it doesn't fit into
my interpretation.  If I had a paper to write, I guarantee I'd come up
with at least a page of thoughts on the "book" mentions in the poem,
how they interrelate, how they form successive steps toward an
epiphany...   0-;          -------------------------------------


>                           W. B. Yeats
>                        Leda and the Swan
>

I did something on this one back in the day, maybe just an essay
question in one of those "blue books" -- do they still have those?
The poetry class I had was taught by Robert Hayden, and we all loved
the guy...
also, there was this really pretty girl named Patty Minty - Mr Hayden
called the roll, I think, and that was really her name on there, and
she would bring this big dog to class.  I think it was a German
shepherd - something that big anyway, although maybe a little
shaggier.  Anyway, she was very attractive.  I know we covered this
poem...

> 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.

this is real easy to picture, despite being out of the realm of probability.
But can't you just partake of the feelings of both of them, of Leda
and of the swan (which is Zeus, right?)
I mean, that helplessness but also this kinky pleasure that she would
be feeling, that is familiar enough; and this drivenness of the god
acting through the animal body, heck, that's pretty familiar too

so you've got 3 questions:
>
> How can those terrified vague fingers push
> The feathered glory from her loosening thighs?

they can't

> And how can body, laid in that white rush,
> But feel the strange heart beating where it lies?

how can [Leda's] body [help] but feel the strange heart [of the swan/god]
so, like, typical male chauvinist, the sensitive female can't help but
feel the feelings of the rapist?
not what Yeats was probably driving at, but still...

anyway, as Annunciations go, this is a speculative Annunciation - we
are posed with the question of whether there was a foreknowledge on
her (Leda's) part of the offspring and all the gyrations about to
ensue - and I suppose anteriorly to that question is the further
question of the foundation of societal chaos - are we to take from
Yeats's words here the suggestion that the root of all evil is sexual
abuse in general?

> Did she put on his knowledge with his power
> Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?

 If so, then Leda is having the sort of misgivings in advance that the
subject of the first poem is having in retrospect, eh wot?