Rain
“Rain” was written while Thomas was in fighting in WWI. This poem has a desperate, lonely feeling, but at the same time, remains hopeful. You can really understand how Thomas was feeling while fighting. You can also get a real sense of Thomas’ chronic depression within this poem.
“Rain”
Rain, midnight rain, nothing but the wild rain
On this bleak hut, and solitude, and me
Remembering again that I shall die
And neither hear the rain nor give it thanks
For washing me cleaner than I have been
Since I was born into this solitude.
Blessed are the dead that the rain rains upon:
But here I pray that none whom once I loved
Is dying tonight or lying still awake
Solitary, listening to the rain,
Either in pain or thus in sympathy
Helpless among the living and the dead,
Like a cold water among broken reeds,
Myriads of broken reeds all still and stiff,
Like me who have no love which this wild rain
Has not dissolved except the love of death,
If love it be towards what is perfect and
Cannot, the tempest tells me, disappoint.
External Fun
Group of girls’ interpretive dance to “Rain
Works Cited
1. _imax. Digital image. [North London Rain]. 2006. 6 Dec. 2007 <http://britlitwiki.s481.sureserver.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/280179920_021daa86dd.jpgv0>.
2. Thomas, Edward. “Edward Thomas.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature Eighth Edition. Ed. Greenblatt Stephen and M.H. Abrams. New York: W&W Norton & Company, 2006. 1956-1959.