Zeus' Rape of Leda (Leda & the Swan)

Author: * DIonysia Xanthippos - 12 Posts on this thread out of 908 Posts sitewide.
Date: Feb 25, 2007 - 15:54

Leda and the Swan. Marble relief. (Roman?) 2nd c BC

LEDA

Now when the god came on him, in his need,
he startled at such beauty -- in a bird!
He vanished into him, bewildered, wild, absurd.
Already his deception had betrayed him to the deed

before he'd tested out the creature's wing,
proved how the thing would feel; but she, she knew
already blown all open what and who
was coming in the swan: knew what one thing

he'd bid her do but too bewildered to withstand
him, hid no more. He flew down, gliding, white,
and pecked her neck, slid through her slipping hand,

released in her his god until, all gone,
he felt, in every feather, real delight
and first became, within her lap, all Swan.

--- Rainer Maria Rilke, 1908. Trans. by Winslow Shea

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
The 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
The 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?

----- William Butler Yeats, 1923