Your worthy take on Dylan Thomas' LAMENT

[RitwijM]

Kindly lend me ur helping hand to fathom the technical aspects of this poem. A fairly detailed analysis would be useful in that the thickheaded me usually misunderstands things that are explained too precisely :wink5:
Your reply, precise or detailed, would be appreciated and ur opinions deservedly taken note of from an unbiased perspective.

[YesNo]

I just listened to it on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1xLuTbBdrA

I haven't got a clue what it's about.

[RitwijM]

Interesting narration to practice narrating along to, YesNo :-) Thanx for the link !

[Nick Capozzoli]

Thanks for the link, nice mesmerizing reading of this by DT. For some reason it reminds me of a poem by ee cummings, "anyone lived in a pretty how town." I like cummings' poem more...mainly because I think I know what it "means."

[mal4mac]

It's hard! Not sure if I'm right at all, but here's what I make of it:

Dylan Thomas — Lament

When I was a windy (blown in every direction) boy and (only) a bit (of a grown man)
And the black spit (nasty piece of work) of the chapel fold, (after the rubbish taught to me in church)
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of women), (dying from a sexual disease)
I tiptoed shy in the gooseberry wood,
The rude owl cried like a tell-tale tit,
I skipped in a blush as the big girls rolled
Nine-pin down on donkey's common,
And on seesaw sunday nights I wooed
Whoever I would with my wicked eyes,
The whole of the moon I could love and leave (I could leave my loves even if I was very much in love)
All the green leaved little weddings' wives (Leave all the young wives who would trap me into a wedding and a small life)
In the coal black bush and let them grieve. (I could leave them depressed and grieving)

When I was a gusty man and a half
And the black beast of the beetles' pews (the church is nasty place - infested with beetles, and run by the petty laws of the beadle)
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of *****es),
Not a boy and a bit in the wick- (Although a man he has the sexual/loving experience of a boy, and is drunk with lust)
Dipping moon and drunk as a new dropped calf, (wick-dipping moon = indulging in sexual love)
I whistled all night in the twisted flues, (whistle = another phallic symbol!)
Midwives grew in the midnight ditches, (midwifes came by hidden paths at night to deliver the babies in shame)
And the sizzling sheets of the town cried, Quick!- (sizzling sheets = gossip on his sexual misdoings which quickly does the rounds, everywhere in town, as if reported by a local newspaper. Also plays on "****s".)
Whenever I dove in a breast high shoal, ("dove" - beautiful double use of this word, expressive of both sexual vigour and innocence)
Wherever I ramped in the clover quilts,
Whatsoever I did in the coal-
Black night, I left my quivering prints. (left the woman pregnant)

When I was a man you could call a man (irony - a man the church gossips would call a man, and a falling off from being a gusty man and a half!)
And the black cross of the holy house, (a depressed kind of Christian who would burn witches!)
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of welcome), (dying of a welcome into the life denying Christian church)
Brandy and ripe in my bright, bass prime, (Brandy drinking is the kind of thing you'd expect of a "fine upstanding man of the community", someone who would be trying not to do anything that would feed the gossips.)
No springtailed tom in the red hot town
With every simmering woman his mouse
But a hillocky bull in the swelter
Of summer come in his great good time
To the sultry, biding herds, I said, (... sexy but sexually inactive women in the church)
Oh, time enough when the blood runs cold, (...irony - when you're dead you will not be able to enjoy sex)
And I lie down but to sleep in bed,
For my sulking, skulking, coal black soul! (Summary - he's given up chasing the naughty women in town to hang out with the nice women in church, and improve his reputation, but he's not getting any, so that's left him bad tempered, reclusive and depressed)

When I was half the man I was
And serve me right as the preachers warn,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of downfall),
No flailing calf or cat in a flame
Or hickory bull in milky grass
But a black sheep with a crumpled horn, (phallic symbolism)
At last the soul from its foul mousehole
Slunk pouting out when the limp time came;
And I gave my soul a blind, slashed eye, (more phallic symbolism!)
Gristle and rind, and a roarers' life,
And I shoved it into the coal black sky
To find a woman's soul for a wife.

Now I am a man no more no more
And a black reward for a roaring life,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of strangers),
Tidy and cursed in my dove cooed room
I lie down thin and hear the good bells jaw--
For, oh, my soul found a sunday wife
In the coal black sky and she bore angels!
Harpies around me out of her womb!
Chastity prays for me, piety sings,
Innocence sweetens my last black breath,
Modesty hides my thighs in her wings,
And all the deadly virtues plague my death! (He's depressed by the tedium of Christian marriage, which doesn't seem to have alleviated the depression caused by his "roaring" life of sexual incontinence.)

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Loved the reading by Dylan Thomas himself, the way he changes his voice from young to old is superb.

[RitwijM]

Thanks a ton, Mal4mac ! You really seemed to have put in a good deal of thought & effort into this.

[mal4mac]

No problem, I think Dylan Thomas is worth a bit of effort.