The poem
The hand that signed the paper felled a city; Five sovereign fingers taxed the breath, Doubled the globe of dead and halved a country; These five kings did a king to death.
The mighty hand leads to a sloping shoulder, The finger joints are cramped with chalk; A goose's quill has put an end to murder That put an end to talk.
The hand that signed the treaty bred a fever, And famine grew, and locusts came; Great is the hand the holds dominion over Man by a scribbled name.
The five kings count the dead but do not soften The crusted wound nor pat the brow; A hand rules pity as a hand rules heaven; Hands have no tears to flow.
The poem seems easily penetrated so I just want to mention that the US Secretary of Defense during the Vietnam War, Robert McNamara, quotes this poem in the documentary Fog of War. Appropriate.
all the hands that sign papers are wrinkled hands, very old hands, they barley hold the ben and a smile revealtheir broken teeth. they are mostly dead
This must be considered aming the classic anti-war poems ever. I remember reading it for the first time as an undergraduate taking a World Survey Course in literature as a Freshman at Saint Johns's University, Colegeville, Mn. It was at the height of the Viet Nam War and the anti-war movement was very strong on campus and elsewhere. The poem speaks for itself. Today, after almost four decades it is so true. The imagery of the war in Iraq,the destruction of that once fertile land and the ravages of war on its leaders and its people make Dylan Thomas' words all the more meaningful. "Hands have no tears to shed"