" With every tercet, the repeated lines take on a different nuance. Reading the poem is like hearing a favorite song sung in a different way, again and again -- every time, a different shade of meaning is brought forth in the refrain of the poem. It is all too easy for a free verse poem to say the same thing in different ways: Thomas uses the same words again and again to convey different shades of emotion: good men, wild men, grave men, all for different reasons, he states, have not borne the inevitability of death with meekness.
The reader comes to understand that repeated words are a paradox -- Thomas tells his father, begs his father, to do what is futile -- to resist death. But Thomas is so persuasive in doing so, the reader cannot help but support the poet in his quest, although why Thomas is so determined to hate the darkness of the afterlife remains a mystery, perhaps even to the poet himself.
Ance's comment is based upon the faulty assumption that there is 'pure' creativity in a lack of structure. However, consider the fact that one of the most...
Thomas' poem is about a similarly simple idea -- morning the death of a father. By crying out in a poetic form, half-hymn, half-primal scream, the duality of rage and grief become manifest. Thomas wrestles with the eternal, unanswerable question that religion counsels that his father must view death as a good night, even while as a human being in love with life, his son cannot accept the finitude of existence. The question's unanswerable and eternal nature is why it must be repeated again and again, and the futility of the poet's rage is why there is no way he can cease begging his father to "rage, rage, against the dying of the light."
Works Cited
Briggs, John. Fire in the Belly. Red Wheel 2000.
"Poetic Form: Villanelle." Poets.org. Published by the Academy of American Poets.
February 10, 2010. http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5796
