Sgt. Stryker's has the first part of Yeats' The Second Coming at the top of their front page. It's a perfect poem for situations where, like in the Middle East, the world is rapidly spiraling into a crap-filled toilet. The second part of the poem is even more interesting and ominous in light of the current situation than the first part:

…
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

The poem, inspired by World War I and the Russian revolution of 1917 (and Yeats' occultism), is an apocalyptic vision of Judeo-Christian civilization falling apart, replaced by a mysterious and seemingly inhuman force. This is all well and good for those of us who love a good apocalyptic vision (and who doesn't?), but it's also led to this poem being completely overused in TV shows, video games, comic books, and similar pop culture products.

As a Yeats fan myself, I'm of two minds on this trend. On one hand, it's good that the poem gets spread about to those who night not otherwise be exposed to it. I was certainly in this boat during my Sci-Fi-Superdork phase in middle school, where the poem was my first exposure to Yeats' work. On the other hand, hack writers will often randomly plop the poem into their mediocre books or screenplays anytime they need something dark or ominous sounding. These works have all the literary value of a sonnet written by a 15 year old Goth, and don't give the poem a good reputation.

Now, however, the situation in the world generally and the mid-east in particular seem to be neatly summed up by the poem. Yeats' Irish nationalism was linked to the partisan violence of the 20th century Irish independence movement, if not directly, and he saw the violence ripping through his country. This experience shows itself in his work, and it's hard not to read it and think of current events.

By the way, Sgt. Stryker's is now my favorite blog, if for no other reason than they have a picture of John Wayne on their front page. John Wayne is God, of course. I'll explain more on that later....