Mortality In Dylan Thomas Poetry

Mortality is a topic frequently addressed in poetry. In Edmund Spenser’s “Amoretti LXXV: One Day I Wrote her Name” and Dylan Thomas’s “In My Craft or Sullen Art”, both poets write about mortality, however take much different views. Dylan Thomas warns against the fleeting nature of human life and urges people to embrace life without fear, whereas Thomas seems quite nonchalant about the idea of death and seems to believe that he can be immortalized through his poetry.
Thomas uses the imagery of the moon to express the mortality of man. The moon acts as a force urging people to embrace their emotions. Thomas writes “in the still night/When only the moon rages/ And the lovers lie abed/ With all their griefs in their arms…Of their most secret heart” (2-5,11). The relationship between the “still night” and the moon represents that between Thomas and the lovers. The “still night” represents darkness and loneliness, and the moon “rages” to fight the …show more content…
Thomas explains in his poem that his message is applicable to everybody but one type of person. He describes this type of person as the “proud man”. Thomas writes, “Not for the proud man apart/From the raging moon I write”(12-13). In the context of the poem, the “proud man” represents the type of person who has enough self-confidence to express their emotions to the people they love and because of that, Thomas states that he doesn’t need to write to them. Central to the message of the poem, life is short and whether or not the “proud man” always gets what he wants, it is better to be let down a few times than to be stuck in the same place always regretting not taking action, but being too scared in the moment to do so. Unlike for the moon, the good of the day doesn’t come without effort for mankind, and for mankind, life is such a fleeting experience that it is always better to be the “proud man” and take