And Death Shall Have No Dominion: Wordnotes

By Dylan Thomas  

Text

And death shall have no dominion.

Dead man 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.

WORD NOTES AND ANNOTATIONS

Stanza I:And death shall have no dominion-The title of Dylan Thomas’s poem “And death shall have no dominion” is strongly and obviously indebted to a particular phrase from the Bible, in the King James translation " Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him."It means death shall not prevail. It shall not dominate and triumph over love and a love of life. Thomas's central theme here is resurrection. Starting from the very title, there are several Christian echoes in the poem, although Thomas treats the theme not only from a religious perspective but also as a celebration of the forces of life to win over death.Dead man naked they shall be one/With the man in the wind and the west moon---Beginning with a Biblical allusion to Christ's resurrection breaking the power of death, this speaks of the power of resurrection over the horrors of death. Dead people have no possession, they are "naked"; their molecules shall become part of the wind of nature and part of the cosmos ("moon").The unity and wholeness of the universe is hinted at by an arresting rearrangement of elements that Dylan Thomas creates in the third line: “the man in the wind and the west moon.” Man in the moon, man in the wind, west wind, west moon—it does not matter how the parts are arranged because all is one.When their bones are picked clean---vultures feed off of carcasses exposed in hot sun until all the meat is removed from the bones.and the clean bones gone---the bones "picked clean" are gone because buried or carried away by predators.When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone-When the time comes that vultures have eaten the flesh from abandoned bones, the bones themselves are buried or carried away by predators.They shall have stars at elbow and foot---an allusion to the idea that the dead rise to dwell among the stars, like the myth of the Seven Sisters of the stars of Pleiades; thus stars twinkle all around the risen dead, at "elbow and foot". Then the dead will rise to the heavens, because death can't hold them (line 1), and shall have stars twinkling all around them, at their elbows and feet. Though all manner of awful thing may happen, death will not conquer, the dead will have resurrection.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- Through a series of paradoxes  Thomas is presenting the contrast between what would usually be expected and what will happen at the end of time.The spirit survives the death of the body and remains in nature.None of these things will come to pass. Despite the onset of insanity, the person will still have a rational and "sane" existence. Even those who have drowned "shall rise again."Despite whatever circumstances occur to force lovers to be absent from one another, their love will continue.These lines indicate  that while death may occur, it will not conquer: on the other side of the veil that separates this life and the next, insanity, the loss of love and drowning will not defeat one's soul. On the other side, sanity will prevail, those who have "fallen" will rise, and love will remain.

Stanza II:Under the windings of the sea......they shan't crack-Next follows a list of the ways "bodies" may die.The poet speaks of lying at the bottom of the ocean, being tortured on racks that rip sinew from bone or on the wheel; he writes of the spirit losing faith at the direst of moments—snapping like something dry and brittle; and, even run through, as if by a sword, death will not defeat man. Through all of these horrible ways a man is robbed of life, death still will not be the conqueror, the winner: man will live on. Twisting on racks when sinews give way---allusion to a Medieval torture machine, the rack, that stretched people apart, tearing their muscles (i.e., sinews) from their bones.Strapped to a wheel--allusion to another Medieval torture machine in which a person was roped onto a wheel that going round and round crushed the person with every turn.unicorn evils run them through--Biblical allusion to Isaiah 34:7 where unicorns are mentioned as being slain with other enemies.Split all ends up they shan't crack-another allusion to the machines of torture that may break bones but won't break the soul, which shall not break ("crack").Here is a list of all manner of horrible things that might happen to the dead or that might cause death. Yet even these things will not hold the dead in bonds: death has no power because of the Resurrection .

Stanza III:No more may gulls cry at their ears...till the sun breaks down-There may come a time when all men are gone from the face of the earth. Sea gulls will no longer cry over the breaking waves; flowers will no longer grow—perhaps rain will no longer fall, but even when the sun "breaks down," death will not win.gulls cry at their ears-allusion to death at sea.Break in the sun till the sun breaks down-unrelenting sun may cause death until the end of the world.These lines give us a series of images of how our spirit will enter the natural world. Our life force is so much a part of nature that we may find our life force entering objects such as a daisy or the sun, but it will definitely not end. The final line of the poem repeats the refrain and the central argument of Thomas: "And Death Shall Have No Dominion.