“The Second Coming” is a poetic description of a lurid scene. In the first stanza, the speaker tells of a falcon, lost in a “widening gyre,” that is unable to the call of its falconer. (“Coming” 1) The speaker continues, “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; / Mere anarchy is loosened upon the world, / The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere / The ceremony of innocence is drowned.” (“Coming” 3-6) This is to say that a global apathy has developed for all things good that are preserved by innocence. The speaker emphasizes her/his point with the concluding lines of the first stanza. “The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity.” (“Coming” 7-8)
In the second Stanza, the speaker addresses an imminent revelation: the Second Coming. The speakers thoughts of a Second Coming are the impetus behind her/his troubling image of Spiritus Mundi (Latin for spirit of the world). This Spiritus Mundi is the spirit of the human race. This is represented by “A shape with a lion body and
The majority of “The Second Coming” is written in free verse with unfrequented instances of iambic pentameter. An example of the aforementioned is “The falcon cannot hear the falconer.” (“Coming” 2) In addition to a majority of free verse, the poem is dominated by free rhyme, with exceptions including “gyre” and “falconer” and “hold” and “word.”
With Yeats’s interest and fascination with the occult and a multifaceted world, he developed theories on many aspects of human nature including patterns in history. (Kuhlpateea) His theory is diagramed as two conical spirals. One is inside the other so that the widest part of the spiral encompasses the smallest spiral of the other. This image captures the conflicting motions that are found inherently in historical happenstance. (Vision 89-92) These motions are applicable to many pieces of history, and are related to the current physical and developmental statuses of Yeats’s time. It is obvious that Yeats saw the world on a brink. The world was approaching the apocalypse.
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