A Postman BIG up and Dylan Thomas

weaver of grass. sent me a much welcomed belated donation to our open day this week.

She addressed the envelope in a somewhat interesting  way.

John Gray (Sheffield !)

"Organiser of the Allotment Day"

Trelawnyd

Flint

Wales

so fair do's to my postie.....he delivered the letter safely yesterday!!!

Thank you again Weaver

x

When we went to my Sister's Flower Show yesterday, I was stopped by a lady from Prestatyn, who had come up to our open day last Sunday.

She was very sweet, and waxed lyrically on  about the pigs and the turkeys and before she turned to go she asked me suddenly if I liked Dylan Thomas.

I told her that apart from Under Milk Wood ( which I remember reading in school) I was afraid that I had not really studied any of his work at all.

She seemed surprised.

"I thought your blog was named after one of his poems!" she said and when I asked her which one she recited the first three verses of "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" a poem she said she remembered from her college days.

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rage at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

I told her that it sounded like some sort of rally cry against giving up when death approaches, which she seemed to agree with but assured her that My "Going Gently" was purely about living, albeit living is a plodding , benign kind of way.

It seemed just  a little surreal that I was listening to an stranger quoting me Welsh Poetry on a sunny afternoon under the vicarage trees....

ps. The phrase "Going Gently" actually comes from the title of a novel by David Nobbs. It is one of my favourite books , which   tells the story of 99-year old Kate Copson's life, in flashback form, while she lies paralysed in a hospital bed after a stroke. From her upbringing and sexual awakening in a Swansea suburb, through the marriage of her five husbands to the murder of one of them by her son. It is a book of great charm, warmth and humour