We see an inner struggle as Leda wants to push away the bird, but is stopped by its "feathered glory" (6). Its "strange heart beating where it lies" (8) fascinates her, this feathered body pressed against her own. The speaker invites our apprehension with his questions. "How can." we are asked, Leda refuse this god-bird? What about the creature entrances her to such an extent that she cannot bring herself to fight against it?.

             The first half of the sestet is a brief flash of the future, but as of yet, we, the readers are uncertain whether it is seen by Leda herself, or presented only to us. Is the "shudder" (9) a shudder of ecstasy or a shudder at the violence of the complete destruction this union will engender? We witness the fall of Troy, and the death of Leda's husband's brother, Agamemnon1. Agamemnon was actually killed by Leda's mortal daughter, Clytemnestra (in a bathtub, no less). All this is guaranteed by the climax of the swan and Leda, the destined children, their destined deeds.

             The final half of the sestet leaves us wondering if it was, in fact, Leda who saw these visions, and tries to offer some explanation for the possibility. The reader is asked if, before the Zeus-swan released her, she received some sort of psychic link to the destiny of two of her children, the mortal daughter of her husband Tyndareus (Clytemnestra), and the immortal daughter of Zeus (Helen). We are left wondering if Leda knew the destinies of the children that had been set into motion with Zeus' rape of her.

             Writing the poem in a Petrarchan sonnet, Yeats sets a tone from the first three words: "A sudden blow" (1). Immediately, we are emotionally involved in the poem. His words indicate to the readers how suddenly and unexpectedly the rape of Leda begins. Yeats writes in the octave the events prior to the union of Zeus and Leda, and the in sestet the ensuing events and visions of them. Though not immediately obvious due, in part, to the shocking aspect of the subject matter and beauty of Yeats' language, we can see that the poem does indeed have a rhyme scheme, following the ababcdcd efgefg pattern.