Second Coming · Tue May 2, 22:31 by Eleri Straker
The Year 9 SATS began today and owing to a peculiarity of timetabling, I unexpectedly ended up teaching my class. Not that this is a problem, as I like them. Anyway, I decided to give them some practice in analysing a poem they’d never seen before. I thought that the best thing for them to tackle was a difficult poem, reasoning that if they could handle it, their exam in a few days’ time would be a doddle.
I read them W.B. Yeats’ “Second Coming.” One girl’s initial response surprised me. “What a sad, beautiful poem,” she said. Her response was purely instinctive and spot on. That’s exactly the description I would have given it.
I gave them little detail about it, simply that it was written in 1919 in response to the horrors of WW1. (I know there are alternative suggestions about the reason for the poem – like things to do with Yeats’ elitism, – but I prefer my explanation as it’s one thirteen year olds can understand.) I then asked them to focus on the first stanza and to decide what the poet was saying. Once they’d understood what anarchy was and the meaning of a ‘widening gyre’, they soon worked out the meaning of the stanza. Someone suggested that the war and all the horrible things that happen in the world were the result of the ‘falcon’ (us) no longer listening to the ‘falconer’ (God), or as one girl added, not being able to hear, as the poet uses the word ‘cannot’. I was impressed.
When they started to analyse the second part of the poem, the girl who had commented on its beauty said, slightly worried what my reaction would be, that it reminded her of Shelley’s ‘Ozymandias’. Needless to say, I was speechless (for once!) as I haven’t taught this class the Shelley poem!
The discussion about what Yeats was saying continued until the end of the lesson and I was impressed by their insight. These students are thirteen and fourteen year olds and they inspired me. Not the other way around. Isn’t that amazing? And humbling.
“Woman is the ende of all mankinde” Honesty is the best policy?
