Alia Starkweather, 82, walks away from her clapboard cottage at the edge of Arcadia Lake in Belchertown toward a new and exciting life on the road. She purchased a 1987 Toyota Minicruiser and set out on her own around Thanksgiving.
Alia Starkweather, 82, walks away from her clapboard cottage at the edge of Arcadia Lake in Belchertown toward a new and exciting life on the road. She purchased a 1987 Toyota Minicruiser and set out on her own around Thanksgiving. Credit: STAFF PHOTO/Andy Castillo

A brief Dylan Thomas discourse

I’d like to suggest a different Dylan Thomas poem to caption Andy Castillo’s wonderful photograph of an 82-year-old preparing to head out for a new life in her camper. “Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night” is a deathbed poem. The subject of this photograph is clearly not “there on that sad height.” If anything, she appears “free and easy under the apple boughs about the lilting house, and happy as the grass was green.” (“Fern Hill” goes on to remind us that time holds us “green and dying.” However, there is no reason to rush it.)

Dick Moulding
​​​​​​​Northampton