Poetry Friday 45

My poetry offerings this week are again inspired by "Doctor Who". As I mentioned in my review of "The Shakespeare Code", the Doctor quotes the third line of this poem by Dylan Thomas:

Do not go gentle into that good night

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave 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.

The rest of the poem, including an audio version, is available here.


Then Will Shakespeare starts to quote to Martha

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a Summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And Summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And oft' is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd:
But thy eternal Summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:

So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.


though he only manages the first line before he's interrupted by the arrival of Queen Elizabeth I. (I have to say, the look on the Doctor's face, as Shakespeare starts his recitation is utterly priceless ! A combination of disbelief and bemusement - as if he's wondering why Shakespeare wants to quote poetry to Martha, although Shakespeare's been flirting with Martha all the way through the episode...)