Yeats
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Yeats Paper
In his poems "The Wild Swans at Coole", "Sailing to Byzantium", and "Lapis Lazuli", William B. Yeats shows his feelings toward time, passion, immorality, aging, and art. Yeats negative undertone toward mortal life is expressed through his rejection of human passion. By eliminating passion he will get closer to becoming a "work" of art, thus making him immortal.
One first sees Yeats negative undertone toward mortal life in "The Wild Swans at Coole". He is amazed by the beauty and perfection of the eternal swans "those brilliant creatures" (13). Yeats is afraid of the inevitable change that comes with age. His "heart is sore"(14) and "All's changed since I, hearing at twilight, the first time on that shore"(15-16). This shows Yeats' rejection of aging and how he is tired of with the pass of time, ever since the day he saw the perfection and beauty on that shore. Yeats then makes it very clear in "Sailing to Byzantium" that he does not want to get older by saying that Byzantium "is no country for old men...