Dylan Thomas
Dylan Thomas
Dylan Marlais Thomaswas a Welsh poet and writer whose works include the poems "Do not go gentle into that good night" and "And death shall have no dominion"; the 'play for voices' Under Milk Wood; and stories and radio broadcasts such as A Child's Christmas in Wales and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog. He became widely popular in his lifetime and remained so after his premature death at the age of 39 in New York City. By...
NationalityWelsh
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth27 October 1914
CitySwansea, Wales
These are but dreaming men. Breathe, and they fade.
My tears are like the quiet drift of petals from some magic rose; and all my grief flows from the rift of unremembered skies and snows. I think that if I touched the earth, it would crumble; it is so sad and beautiful, so tremulously like a dream.
I believe in New Yorkers. Whether they’ve ever questioned the dream in which they live, I wouldn’t know, because I won’t ever dare ask that question.
Now behind the eyes and secrets of the dreamers in the streets rocked to sleep by the sea, see the titbits and topsyturvies, bobs and buttontops, bags and bones, ash and rind and dandruff and nailparings, saliva and snowflakes and moulted feathers of dreams, the wrecks and sprats and shells and fishbones, whale-juice and moonshine and small salt fry dished up by the hidden sea.
I think, that if I touched the earth, It would crumble; It is so sad and beautiful, So tremulously like a dream.
I love you more than anybody in the world... I love you for millions and millions of things, clocks and vampires and dirty nails and squiggly paintings and lovely hair and being dizzy and falling dreams.
Dylan talked copiously, then stopped. 'Somebody's boring me,' he said, 'I think it's me.'
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though lovers be lost love shall not; And death shall have no dominion.
You can tear a poem apart to see what makes it tick... You're back with the mystery of having been moved by words. The best craftsmanship always leaves holes and gaps... so that something that is not in the poem can creep, crawl, flash or thunder in.
But time has set its maggot on their track.
There is only one position for an artist anywhere; and that is upright.
Do not go gentle into that good night but rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light