Fern Hill

Published in 1945, 'Fern Hill' is a deeply nostalgic poem that recalls the exuberant freedom of childhood summers spent on a Welsh farm. It celebrates youthful innocence and the feeling of immortality before time inevitably claims it, famously concluding that 'Time held me green and dying.'

The poem is directly inspired by Fernhill, a real Carmarthenshire dairy farm owned by Dylan Thomas's aunt, Ann Jones. Thomas spent his childhood holidays there, and the farm's lush, pastoral landscape heavily influenced the vivid imagery of apple boughs and green grass found in the text.

The poem is written in Thomas's characteristically lush, incantatory style, utilizing a highly complex internal rhyme scheme rather than a strict, traditional meter. It relies heavily on biblical cadences, alliteration, and repeating refrains to create a musical, rolling rhythm that mimics the passage of time.

In the poem, the color green repeatedly symbolizes youth, vitality, and the golden innocence of childhood. Thomas portrays himself as 'green and carefree,' using the hue to represent the seamless unity between the boy and the natural world before the awareness of mortality sets in.