Dad, Do Not

Dylan Thomas may have written the greatest love poem ever to a dad. "Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night" (not an official title, just the first line of the otherwise untitled poem) is included on this week's objet d'eBay, an LP (i.e., long playing) record of the Welsh poet reading some "hits."

Thomas aimed the poem squarely at his dying father, a school teacher poet who never reached the lyrical heights achieved by his son. However, it somehow also captures the lightening of existence in a few sparse words. There is the glory and pathos of his own life, an episode of which will be appearing shortly at your local movieplex as "The Edge of Love." However, the poem is more universal in appeal, somehow also touching all who read or hear it.

So Happy Father's Day, dads. And don't die. But if you do, make sure to have left something brilliant of yourself with your child that he or she can memorialize you forever.