Do not go gentle into that good night (page 6)

slimboyfat

But it should be too easy either. Want hard try T S Eliot.

funkyderek

Here's an MP3 of the poem ("Do not go gentle...") recited by the poet.

Hi folks, I faded last night and went to sleep! I didn't know Dylan Thomas wrote the poem on the night his father was dying. That explains a lot. Sometimes when poetry is obscure, I still like the cadence and rhyme and just the flow of the words. But I do like to understand it, too. For instance Blake's poem about Jerusalem, great imagery and I like the pace of the words. Not sure I really get what dark satanic mills are, though.

Robdar

"Curse! Bless me with your fierce tears!" Does he want his father to curse against his fate? Would he be happier (blessed) to see his father fighting his fate rather than passively accepting it? "Don't give up Dad, fight! I need you around longer."

I've always thought that this was the meaning. Of course, the poet isn't saying, which is why we ponder. Pondering is good.

slimboyfat

Not sure I really get what dark satanic mills are

It's a socialist anthem. The 'dark Satanic mills' were the same ones Marx and Engels exposed early in the nineteenth century as being the inhumane result of capitalism.

The "new Jerusalem" was the improved society working class men returning home from the First World War were promised by the political elite as a reward for fighting for King and Country. Better homes were to be built, improved schools for children, and better working conditions.

slimboyfat

Yes Robdar I agree. I think it means 'don't give up the will to life', along Nietzschean lines. Better to die fighting.

slimboyfat

Found this wiki page interesting:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Do_Not_Go_Gentle_into_that_Good_Night

And it doesn't say it was written while his father was dying, but I am sure I read that somewhere.

GentlyFeral

If the meaning is so obscure that we are lost before we even begin to consider it, what's the point?

amicus, if that's actually a valid critique, I'm screwed

Here is my own death poem, written over 5 years ago – obscure but evocative – and, I fear, less optimistic than the others offered here:

Sommeil Macabre

He was an earthling once: and now
The eye turns backward in the head.
The sleeper is well on his way
Out of his skin, beyond the reach
Of ecstasy or rage or dread.

The sightless eye slid open, and
The wordless mind illiterate read
Black ink upon black pages; found
All tongues are foreign now; and turned
To hungry trembling sleep instead.

The muscle sags upon the bone:
The hand too slack to lift the bread
To flaccid lips that hunger still
For sweeter food than this, for here
Even the sugar is made of lead.

The awkward flesh in mute debauch
Lies orderly with legs unspread.
Unpanting lungs make voiceless shouts
An orgy of silence; still tongues lap
Dry juices, unseen pink and red.

The Brownian motion of the soul
Turns the eye backward in the head
Suavely & gently; yet it is
The cosmic fibrillation that
Will tear the hard-lit stars to shreds.

g ently f eral

Hortensia

I was thinking about this thread today, while driving home, and I remembered something from quite a while ago. When I was a teenager I was an usher at the Old Globe Theater in San Diego. They had another theater next door, more modern stuff than Shakespeare. I went to see Anthony Zerba do a performance of e. e. cummings poetry. It was a really good evening, and all Zerba did was recite cummings's poetry for a couple of hours. So I guess I do like poetry recited by someone really good. Of course, I liked e. e. cummings anyway, but the evening at the theater was illuminating.

Thanks for the explanation of the Jerusalem poem by Blake. I read a lot about that era, but mostly fiction, not poetry. I think the soldiers in WWI were far more disillusioned and bitter than Vietnam vets, for instance. Such a huge struggle, and it didn't really change much for the working man. I remember reading some good poetry out of WWI, but didn't realize Blake's poem was about that.

amicus

amicus, if that's actually a valid critique, I'm screwed

Nothing I write late at night after downing half a dozen beers is valid. ;-)

I think the soldiers in WWI were far more disillusioned and bitter than Vietnam vets,

I agree. I know war period is nasty, but the trench warfare so many suffered through in WWI was nightmarish. It's a wonder any of the survivors remained sane.

Do not go gentle into that good night

Sommeil Macabre

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