The Poetry Corner

What Magic Drum?

By William Butler Yeats

He holds him from desire, all but stops his breathing lest primordial Motherhood forsake his limbs, the child no longer rest, Drinking joy as it were milk upon his breast. Through light-obliterating garden foliage what magic drum? Down limb and breast or down that glimmering belly move his mouth and sinewy tongue. What from the forest came? What beast has licked its young?