W.B. Yeats’ poem The Second Coming, penned in the tumultuous aftermath of World War I and the Irish conflicts, resonates even today as a chilling reflection of societal unraveling. Its opening lines are frequently invoked to describe periods of chaos, yet delving deeper into the poem reveals a more profound and unsettling vision, particularly in its cryptic imagery of A Rocking cradle and a mysterious “rough beast.”
Unraveling the Gyre: The First Stanza’s Descent into Anarchy
The poem’s first stanza paints a stark picture of disintegration:
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Yeats masterfully employs metaphors of spiraling gyres and falcons losing their connection to their falconer to symbolize a world losing control. Phrases like “Things fall apart” and “Mere anarchy is loosed” have become iconic shorthand for societal breakdown because they so powerfully capture the essence of chaos. The stanza culminates in a bleak assessment of human nature, where the virtuous are paralyzed while the wicked act with fervent zeal. This initial imagery sets the stage for a poem concerned with more than just surface-level disorder; it hints at a deeper, more fundamental shift.
Beyond the Chaos: A Glimpse of the “Second Coming” and the Rough Beast
Many analyses stop at the first stanza, using it as a convenient soundbite for contemporary anxieties. However, the poem continues into darker, more ambiguous territory:
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?
This second part of the poem moves from societal observation to prophetic vision. The anticipated “Second Coming” is not a comforting return of a savior, but a terrifying “vast image” emerging from the Spiritus Mundi, Yeats’ concept of a collective human consciousness holding all of history and memory.
The Sphinx and the Spiritus Mundi: Symbols of a Primordial Force
The image Yeats conjures is that of a Sphinx, a creature with “lion body and the head of a man,” possessing a “gaze blank and pitiless as the sun.” This is not a benevolent redeemer, but a primordial, powerful, and indifferent force. Yeats presents the Sphinx as a symbol drawn from the Spiritus Mundi, suggesting that this coming force is not external but arises from within humanity itself, perhaps representing our deepest, most dangerous instincts resurfacing. The power of this imagery lies in its very ambiguity; we are not told explicitly what this “it” is, leaving room for a multitude of interpretations and anxieties.
“A Rocking Cradle”: Social Upheaval and Disturbed Sleep
The poem’s most haunting line, and where the idea of a rocking motion truly takes hold, is: “That twenty centuries of stony sleep / Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle.” Here, Yeats uses the seemingly gentle image of a rocking cradle, typically associated with peace and infancy, and twists it into a symbol of violent disturbance.
The “stony sleep” of twenty centuries can be interpreted as the era of Christian civilization, now violently disrupted. The rocking cradle is no longer a source of comfort but a metaphor for social upheaval, the very forces of chaos described in the first stanza. This rocking is not a soothing lullaby but a jarring, unsettling motion that awakens a long-dormant nightmare. It suggests that the foundations of civilization, once thought stable, are now being shaken, leading to the emergence of something monstrous.
A Warning for the Present: Pay Attention to the Rocking
Yeats’ poem, far from offering solace, serves as a stark warning. It urges us to “wake up” and “pay attention” to the signs of change and upheaval. The poem doesn’t provide easy answers or comfort; instead, it confronts us with profound questions about the nature of civilization, the cyclical nature of history, and the forces lurking beneath the surface of societal order. The image of a rocking cradle turned nightmarish remains a potent symbol for our own times, reminding us to be vigilant and understand the complex forces shaping our world, lest we too awaken a “rough beast” we cannot control. Let us not ignore the rocking, but strive to understand the tremors that disturb our collective sleep.
