William Butler Yeats, as many of you may know, is the writer of "The Second Coming." It might be helpful to know a bit about him as you study the poem.
Yeats - born June 13, 1865 - was a strong Irish Catholic, raised to never question the Catholic Church. Anyone who went against anything said by preists in the Church would be punished severelly. He grew up obeying the Word of God and whatever was spoken by the preists.
Eventually, World War I started, and the Irish had to help Britain in the war. A preist came to Yeats and told him that this was God's war, and that God wanted him to fight for their country. Not knowing any better, Yeats obeyed, and became a soldier fighting for Ireland. He and another soldier became good friends in the war. One day, Yeats watched his friend get blown up by a land mine before his very eyes. He witnessed the death of his war companion who he had stood by for his entire career as a soldier.
He came back from the war with barely a scratch physically, but was emotionally and spiritually damaged. He went back to the priest who had convinced him to go to war, and, infuriated, expressed his anger to the preist for lying to him. He tore himself from the Catholic Church, too hurt to continue to listen to the Word of God spoken by the preist who had lied to him so cruelly. He then wrote this poem, "The Second Coming," about what he felt was the true meaning of the "second coming" of Christ.
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