My dad died last month after battling several illnesses for 3 years and I've just come to realize that this poem could have been written about us. I had read the poem in school and always liked it because I knew it was a poem encouraging defiance towards death, but your interpretation now makes perfect sense to me. For 3 years I watched my once proud, independent, and strong dad struggle to breathe after taking a few steps. After he got diagnosed with heart failure, I tried admitting him to the hospital but it was in the middle of the COVID shutdowns and they wouldn't admit him until he got a lot worse with fluid in his lungs and Many others would have just given up and refuse to do therapy and then just go gentle into that good night but not him! He did the therapy that he hated doing and made it back home. His doctor secretly told me he only had a few more months left in him. For the next 2 1/2 years however, even though he was on oxygen, he took fists full of meds, used his nebulizer, shake vest, ventilator, and his walking therapies and was stable. When times would get tough and he'd be down on himself, I was there to raise his spirits up and remind him of who he was, encourage him to be engaged in the world and the living. We even talked about the different kinds of men who have come and gone. Even in his last seconds in life, he refused to go gentle into that good night.
we all miss our parents so be bold in life and have kids. do your best and pass on knowledge but we are all going to go, no shame in this. We are all children twice.
I interpret this poem slightly differently, I think he is not saying "don't die", but "fight the doomed battle and inspire those who can see it". This is I think, also because I see the "Grave men" stanza differently, I read it as actual dying men, with a literal blinding sight they realize even if they are near their end they can at least die burning (thus meteor) and not peacefully. This also fits quite well with the words "curse, bless" quite well I think. He is saying "curse me with seeing you die a losing battle, but bless and inspire me by knowing you died in a blaze". Though even if there are slight differences in what I understood I really enjoyed your analysis! Thank you!!
Thank goodness you’re here. I was all but cursing her. I feel like she is talking about HER father. Not his. What she HOPES or assumes her father will go through. I believe she doesn’t love her father or even hates him but pretending not to through life & she herself is scared of death. I love that you were here. Wonderful & perspective is exact.
I believe when poets talk about death, it’s also in figurative sense. Do no go gentle .. do not go without a fight into that vegetative state where you have no dream and no fight left in you and you just wait to die .. live and fight while you live.. don’t give up.. that’s how I read it.
This happened on my father's deathbed, He was with open eyes pointing to the ceiling...He'd had a stroke and couldn't verbalize, that's why this poem means so much to me... Thank you Dylan Thomas...
I will never forget my uncle in his death bed. I was the last to see him alive after visiting him in the VA hospital after work. I had no idea he was about to die. As I was leaving the room he put his hand up to shake in a "grasp" shake which I did. I got home to my parents about 30 minutes later and they told me that the hospital called and that he had died about 10 minutes ago. I went right back to the hospital and saw him with the back of the bed raised, his right hand in a fist on his chest, middle finger extended. To this day, I don't know if it was for the doctors and nurses at the hospital or the world in general (probably).
The Brits tend to claim any meritorious Irish person as English so we can live with an occasional borrowing! He shared years of friendship and dissipation with his Irish contemporary, Brendan Behan and his wife Caitlin MacNamara had Irish ancestry.
Admirable poetic form. Very musical poem and inspiring. No "message" other than a tenacious love of life, perahps realized too late by many / most of us. None of us really lives life as though every moment might be our last. We all remain distracted and pre-occupied with trivia, survival, preparation, selfish concerns.
By saying curse, he might wanna mean "swear". It is like when we are in a difficult situation and try to do our best to get away from this situation, with the anger or maybe some kinda inner power we swear to encourage ourselves. So he wants his father to not let go and curse and swear maybe to encourage himself.
Dylan Thomas had the most sonorous quality to his voice, with impeccable diction. You too have a wonderful quality to your voice, I enjoy your accent. Thank you for your thoughts, I certainly learned a little more about this poem. I totally forgive you for claiming Dylan was Irish.
It's about not giving up. No matter what, in spite of what. When you've had a thousand lifetimes of hardships and can still stand, you know what you are capable of
I love how Nolan put this poem in Interstellar. The little girl that doesn’t want her dad to leave. The dad that leaves on a great adventure risking death to save human life. Beautiful.
thank you for doing this, it was very helpful. I love Dylan Thomas and his Shakespearean (sounding) language. Not being a lit major I always thought this poem might also be to someone going blind, but your interpretation works better. Thomas was Welsh, though, not Irish. And he only lived less than a year longer than his father did. Sad. Thanks again for the excellent video.
Thank you so much for this posting! You are fantastic! In the end of the poem I believe he comes to some sort of acceptance about his father's death, because he recognizes that his father is on a sad height and basically cries out that death, which is seen as the curse of life, bless him now . I view him realizing that death would actually be a blessing instead that would relieve his father of the pain he's going through. I imagine the author at the end is very exhausted after passionately preaching to his father about all of the reasons one should fight against death which leads him to let out a childlike whimper one last time just begging his father to stay even though he realized it was time for him to go. Ultimately in my interpretation it's a sad acceptance. If that makes any sense please forgive my lack of punctuation on RU-vid LOL
I only just noticed the neat opposites of the first two line ends that set the rhyme scheme off ( Night - Day). Another thing I wonder is in the last two lines "You my father ...../ curse, bless me now" might be a subtle allusion to what Catholics say at confessional "Bless me father, for I have sinned". Did he perhaps see his own anger as self-indulgent, but if his father would rage and rave, it would somehow give absolution for the rage he felt himself, that it would feel OK for him to be angry.
That was beautiful. I weep everytime I read this poem. I’ve always interpreted the “wild ones” as warriors and people of power who fly high and work hard to do great things, and they regret the time they lost because they were so focused on their goals. What do you think?
I think that landscape is so important in the formulation of poetry. Dylan Thomas was born and lived his life close to the sea. He knew cliffs, steep drops to the sea. 'That sad height'. I know the landscape of it.
There is a modern poem that I enjoyed very much and would love to see you do a video on it- but recommend it either way. The comedian, Johnny Vegas wrote a poem about last orders for a show called "8 Out of 10 Cats Does Countdown," and it is incredibly moving.
It is a beautiful poem of a desperate son by his father's deathbed. It can reduce you to tears! The constant celestial references hint at a world beyond ourselves, the universe, INFNITY
I believe is related to the dark night of the soul, subconscious leads you into inner battle as your good or bad, choose dark or light I have been through this and went down this rabbit whole there is a light at the end of the tunnel and you rage for light that you embrace yourself and you forgive you and you then get a inner peace and levelling up consciously into having a new perception of things.
The level of need to take an inch of high ground because someone made a mistake is truly astounding. Oddly enough, there may be more angry comments about the birthplace of the poet than there are people in Wales. Anyhow, "And you, my father, there on the sad height." I interpret this as the point of completion. As to say, his life in full has brought him this far. It is sad that he has reached this point but it is inevitable. Following with, "Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray." It seems to me that this is a plea to see some sort of emotion in his father. As if he is begging him to leave the world with a life affirming explosion. Just my two cents. Had a dream about the poem for some reason so I immediately watched a few readings of it and came across this. May you and the proud supporters of Welsh heritage find some peace 😅
I think another interpretation of the grave men part could be done through the second verse: "Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay", if I'm not mistaken gay in this context means happiness/excitement so you could interpret it as an "ignorance(blind eyes) is bliss" type of thing. In that case, we could interpret the first part talking about blinding sight as denial; Serious men, near death, who refuse to believe the gravity of their circumstances, in their denial show this great excitement or will to live, and they rage against the prospect of death. I would love to know your opinion on this.
U r an angel...and u explain any poem in a good way...thank u so much.....but have a comment. . I hope u explain the poem with figure of speech..plz ..
En lugar de pedir a su padre que se resigne a la muerte , que se deje arrastrar por ella, le pide que se resista, que luche, que se cabree y perjure (si he entendido bien). Eso demuestra también profundo amor y respeto hacia su padre, porque la posición cómoda es que en el lecho de muerte los padres se despidan de forma silenciosa y elegante; nos educan en cierta manera para no armar un escandalo solo porque nos estemos muriendo... ¿Cómo puede ser eso? por eso me gusta tanto esta poesía.
You can overthink sometimes. The purpose of a poet is to touch the mystic, and then to take them with you. They need certain strategies, musicians require cords.
I've read this poem for years and have thought about it for a long time. After many years of caring for the geriatric population in their final years, I thought to myself, "I wonder if his father died of pneumonia?" That really is a horrifying experience to watch a person die from that dreadful disease. While I pondered this a friend of mine looked it up, and yes :( his father passed from pneumonia. I can imagine Thomas at his fathers beside, writing this as he watches his father both fight for breath while drowning in fluids and mucous. Gruesome.
i like this short poem the best: “ death smiles at us all, all a man can do is smile back”. meaning death will come for us one day, i know this we all know this but death don’t scare me, when it does come for me imma kill death lol me smiling on the inside hurrah Marines !
that is not fair. There are a lot of us - like me - that are learning this poem for the first time. This is the best reading of this poem, for me, so far.
Do you know the sonnets of Shakespeare, a famous Ethiopian poet, by any chance? Or perhaps the novels of Dickens, that wonderful novelist from the Philippines? I strongly recommend The Republic too, by Plato that famous philosopher from New Jersey.
Otherwise, great analysis! Poets are so often tied to national identities. Which is a good thing; it shows how much we value them. For example, the unofficial anthem , the more popular anthem for my country of England is 'Jerusalem'. It is not 'God save the King'. Jerusalem is a poem by William Blake set to music.
Hi, I am a Chinese student who likes to read the poem. Thanks for sharing insight into this poem, I like the film Interstellar and like the poem, especially after your interpretation, thank you!
Are you sure? I’m from Swansea as well. I thought he went to the old Grammar School on the hill and this was closed I believe in the early fifties. I’m virtually certain he didn’t go to either Dynevor or Bishop Gore. If I’m wrong I apologise to you.
