How does the poet present his feelings towards the swans

The swans are the poem's most prominent symbols. They remain unchanged despite everything that has changed in the speaker's life. The swans also symbolize beauty, grace and energy, and the poem endows them with a mythical status, portraying them as divine creatures unmoved by time and immune to pain and weariness.

In poetry and literature, birds often represent freedom and flight away from the confines of human life. These swans definitely offer an escape from the speaker's fears about getting old. They may represent Yeats’ love Maud Gonne, who rejected him. Yeats was able to let go of this love as he gets older, but he continued to treasure her memory, as the speaker treasures the sight of the swans on the water, though it brings a pang to his heart. Yeats often associated swans with the mystical world; as creatures that can float on water and fly, they are in communion with life’s opposing forces, reaching divine status in their peaceful acceptance of life’s contradictions.

Swans represent creativity, beauty, and life. In Greek mythology, swans were used to symbolize Zeus and therefore the rise of the Greek civilization and Western knowledge, which idealized perfection.