Not forever shall the Lord of the red hail

Dylan Thomas

1914 to 1953

Poem Image

Not forever shall the Lord of the red hail
Hold in his velvet hand the can of blood ;
He shall be wise and let his brimstone spill,
Free from their burning nests the arrows’ brood.
And sweet shall fall contagion from his side,
And loud his anger stamp upon the hill.

As fire falls, two hemispheres divide,
Shall drown the boys of battle in their swill,
The stock and steel that bayonet from the mud,
The fields yet undivided behind the skull.
Both mind and matter at the scalding word
Shall fall away, and leave one singing shell.

A hole in space shall keep the shape of thought,
The lines of earth, the curving of the heart,
And from this darkness spin the golden soul.
Intangible my world shall come to naught,
The solid world shall wither in the heat,
How soon, how soon, O lord of the red hail!