Do not go gentle into that good night (audio)

by Dylan Thomas

Inspired by the Poetry Foundation’s selection of this piece as the “Poem of the Day,” I gift you Dylan Thomas reading it himself. This poem was first published in the journal Botteghe Oscure in 1951. It was written in 1947 while Thomas visited Florence with his family. It has been suggested that the poem was written for Thomas's dying father, although he did not die until just before Christmas in 1952.

The full text is below—though I highly, highly recommend listening to the audio, either in tandem with reading the poem or with your eyes closed / laid prone / rattled by Thomas’ vibrato.

Thomas Cole, “The Voyage of Life: Old Age” (1840)

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.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on that sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.