What aspects of Modernism are apparent in "The Wild Swans at Coole" by W.B. Yeats?eg. historical discontinuity, alienation, individualism,...

"The Wild Swans at Coole," by William Butler Yeats, may
seem at first glance to be a traditional poem about the beauty of nature.  Yeats notes
the trees "in their autumn beauty," and the "mysterious, beautiful" swans who "delight
men's eyes."

Upon deeper inspection, however, Yeats's poem
is pessimistic and thoroughly modern.  The poet's heart has grown "sore" and old, a
common plight of the existensialist who sees no chance of winning man's battle with the
world. 

Although he has been watching the swans for
nineteen years, he feels alienated from them when the swans fly away from
him:

I
saw...

All suddenly mount

And
scatter wheeling great broken rings

Upon their clamorous
wings.

The poet seems to envy
the swans who paddle together in "companionable streams," while he travels alone, having
long since given up dreams of "passion or conquest."