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And Death Shall Have No Dominion
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9.1
/10
(71
votes)
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And death shall have no dominion.
Dead mean naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.
And death shall have no dominion.
Under the windings of the sea
They lying long shall not die windily;
Twisting on racks when sinews give way,
Strapped to a wheel, yet they shall not break;
Faith in their hands shall snap in two,
And the unicorn evils run them through;
Split all ends up they shan't crack;
And death shall have no dominion.
And death shall have no dominion.
No more may gulls cry at their ears
Or waves break loud on the seashores;
Where blew a flower may a flower no more
Lift its head to the blows of the rain;
Though they be mad and dead as nails,
Heads of the characters hammer through daisies;
Break in the sun till the sun breaks down,
And death shall have no dominion.
Dylan Thomas
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Read poems about / on: flower, death, sea, faith, sun, rain, moon, lost, wind, star, rose, running
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Comments about this poem (And Death Shall Have No Dominion
by
Dylan Thomas
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Dylan Thomas
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Jacqui Thewless
(7/15/2009 5:53:00 PM) |
This is, probably, my favourite poem. It was 'love at first reading', when I was 12 years old - and I am now 53. I can't agree with Joel. For me, everything hard, harsh, mad, insane (evil, perhaps?) is overcome - or, perhaps, vindicated - by what Thomas calls 'characters' - namely that which is uniquely personal in individuals. Look again at how the swell surges towards that line: 'Heads of the characters hammer through daisies'. It is a deeply, powerfully positive poem, well known and very much loved by people of all age-groups especially because of the spiritual/emotional position of bravery and transcendence from which it derives.
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Joel Levenson
(3/25/2009 9:16:00 PM) |
I think the first thing to notice is that 'And death shall have no dominion' is a very conventional assertion in a Christian society. A lso, a line beginning with 'And' is very characteristic of the King James Bible. So Thomaas starts off as if it were going to be a poem about Christian redemption.
Then suddenly the dead are naked and one with the west wind; they have stars at their elbows and feet, are tortured on a wheel but do not break they are mad but will be sane.
This is a mad lyrical universe where there is no sin and redemption; there are only insane things that eventuallykill you, but love survives and madness is cured and the sunk rise again. 'Where, O death, is thy sting? where, O death, thy victory? ' is taken out of its resligious context and put into a world that is magical and lyrical and insane, not quite the real world but apoetic world that seems unlikely to offer the hope of redemption but acccoding to the poet does.
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Ronald Speight
(3/14/2009 7:25:00 AM) |
I feel that it expresses the trials of life but by saying 'and death shall have no dominion' the poet is stating life is just worth it or maybe my feelings come from young eyes
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Deborah Wilson
(3/13/2009 4:29:00 PM) |
'Though lovers be lost love shall not' is a great line, but I don't think that this poem is (exclusively, at least) about the perseverence of soul. In the first stanza we have these wonderful images of enduring love, the dead rising again, 'hav[ing] stars at elbow and foot'-really uplifting. But each stanza gets starker and strips away some of our illusions about the solace of death. The second stanza lacks the lovely images of the first, but we can tell ourselves that the idea that the horrible things in life will no longer have any hold on us is a hopeful one, at least. Then there's the third stanza. There's a return to more pleasant images-waves breaking on the shore, flowers blowing in the rain-but a reminder that we will not be taking part in the pleasant or the horrible things any longer/ever again. A poem that amazes me every time I read it.
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Macklin Kleber
(11/18/2008 12:52:00 PM) |
This poem's depth and intensity is beyond anything I have ever read before. BEST POEM EVER! ! ! !
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Jackie Symonds
(4/8/2008 7:25:00 PM) |
I love it! If he was alive I'd want to meet him
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Lesa K
(8/2/2006 3:01:00 PM) |
This is another of my all-time favorite poems! My favorite lines are these: : : 'Though lovers be lost love shall not; And death shall have no dominion.' This poem reminds me of the perserverance of soul.... there are some who go thru great lengths because they strive forward through incredible odds. I actually wrote a poem which was inspired by this one. My poem is called 'Although Lovers Be Lost.'
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