“The Second Coming” (pp. 1109-10), by W. B. Yeats is a very good poem in which Yeats explains his position that events in time move in two thousand year cycles. He compares the movement of time to a gyre (1) or funnel that gets wider, or narrower, as you move from one end to another. In “The Second Coming”, Yeats tells us that a widening cycle that began with the birth of Jesus continued for twenty …showed first 75 words of 235 total…

…showed last 75 words of 235 total…drops again (18)” and “vexed to nightmare (20).” It also shows in use of the word “Bethlehem” in the phrase “slouching toward Bethlehem (22).” Here, “Bethlehem” does not refer to the actual city in present-day Israel, which is the site of much unrest and the birthplace of Jesus. Yeats uses “Bethlehem” in a figurative sense to mean that something is about to be born; it can also be a reference to “bedlam” or anarchy, as mentioned in line 4.