"welsh" poems
To live in Wales is to be conscious
At dusk of the spilled blood
That went into the making of the wild sky,
Dyeing the immaculate rivers
In all their courses.
It is to be aware,
Above the noisy tractor
And hum of the machine
Of strife in the strung woods,
Vibrant with sped arrows.
You cannot live in the present,
At least not in Wales.
There is the language for instance,
The soft consonants
Strange to the ear.
There are cries in the dark at night
As owls answer the moon,
And thick ambush of shadows,
Hushed at the fields' corners.
There is no present in Wales,
And no future;
There is only the past,
Brittle with relics,
Wind-bitten towers and castles
With sham ghosts;
Mouldering quarries and mines;
And an impotent people,
Sick with inbreeding,
Worrying the carcase of an old song. To live in Wales is to be conscious
At dusk of the spilled blood
That went into the making of the wild sky,
Dyeing the immaculate rivers
In all their courses.
It is to be aware,
Above the noisy tractor
And hum of the machine
Of strife in the strung woods,
Vibrant with sped arrows.
You cannot live in the present,
At least not in Wales.
There is the language for instance,
The soft consonants
Strange to the ear.
There are cries in the dark at night
As owls answer the moon,
And thick ambush of shadows,
Hushed at the fields' corners.
There is no present in Wales,
And no future;
There is only the past,
Brittle with relics,
Wind-bitten towers and castles
With sham ghosts;
Mouldering quarries and mines;
And an impotent people,
Sick with inbreeding,
Worrying the carcase of an old song.
20.5k
Mother, the Word timeless Hymnals devote
Bore her Best Ribbon in Prayer and Gift
With the Earth her Nature's Theatre denote
Four Years Beyond; She would make her own Lift
I speak of the Fruit all may come to Love,
Branched with Four Maidens and a Knight do Sponsor
And the King, whose Black Gold sprouts well-above,
Branded Pride onto her; And gave her Honour
Well that their Woolen Rope I can't compete
Plus the Ring advised by the Prince of the North
Still, a Grounded Vow I plan to complete
For an Aunt called TRUST; And all that she's Worth.
Grateful much, M'am, for your Good Decision
Despite me Un-Known; The Owl you Rendition.
Mar 9, 2013
Mar 9, 2013 at 5:31 AM UTC
Sunshine,
Birdsong
And children drunk on
Lemonade
And laughter.
That Welsh picnic
Has lasted forty years
And will last forty more
In daydream
And nightmare.
The stream babbled
Over pebbles,
Fern fronds
Brushed our sun-browned shins
Till the dead sheep
Slugged us in the guts.
Bloated and bulbous,
The body dammed the stream,
Its lifeless eyes
Crawling with life.
Those pearly marbles were
A child’s looking glass into death.
The rocks we hurled at it
In reckless revulsion
Were the screams
Of violated youth,
And those empty dead sheep thuds
The dawning of our mortality.
Mar 21, 2011
Mar 21, 2011 at 3:20 AM UTC
A Letter To My Aunt Discussing The Correct Approach To Modern Poetry
To you, my aunt, who would explore
The literary Chankley Bore,
The paths are hard, for you are not
A literary Hottentot
But just a kind and cultured dame
Who knows not Eliot (to her shame).
Fie on you, aunt, that you should see
No genius in David G.,
No elemental form and sound
In T.S.E. and Ezra Pound.
Fie on you, aunt! I'll show you how
To elevate your middle brow,
And how to scale and see the sights
From modernist Parnassian heights.
First buy a hat, no Paris model
But one the Swiss wear when they yodel,
A bowler thing with one or two
Feathers to conceal the view;
And then in sandals walk the street
(All modern painters use their feet
For painting, on their canvas strips,
Their wives or mothers, minus hips).
Perhaps it would be best if you
Created something very new,
A ***** novel done in Erse
Or written backwards in Welsh verse,
Or paintings on the backs of vests,
Or Sanskrit psalms on lepers' chests.
But if this proved imposs-i-ble
Perhaps it would be just as well,
For you could then write what you please,
And modern verse is done with ease.
Do not forget that 'limpet' rhymes
With 'strumpet' in these troubled times,
And commas are the worst of crimes;
Few understand the works of Cummings,
And few James Joyce's mental slummings,
And few young Auden's coded chatter;
But then it is the few that matter.
Never be lucid, never state,
If you would be regarded great,
The simplest thought or sentiment,
(For thought, we know, is decadent);
Never omit such vital words
As belly, genitals and -----,
For these are things that play a part
(And what a part) in all good art.
Remember this: each rose is wormy,
And every lovely woman's germy;
Remember this: that love depends
On how the Gallic letter bends;
Remember, too, that life is hell
And even heaven has a smell
Of putrefying angels who
Make deadly whoopee in the blue.
These things remembered, what can stop
A poet going to the top?
A final word: before you start
The convulsions of your art,
Remove your brains, take out your heart;
Minus these curses, you can be
A genius like David G.
Take courage, aunt, and send your stuff
To Geoffrey Grigson with my luff,
And may I yet live to admire
How well your poems light the fire.
6.5k
i still straddle the fence on this
immigration reform manifesto
i see both sides of the story
it's good to have the grandfather clause
for the immigrants in my bloodstream
- the scrappy scots-irish-ingles-welsh
in me - but too late for the cherokee
behind the old fences of history.
r ~ 11/9/14
Nov 9, 2014
Nov 9, 2014 at 9:57 AM UTC
Off to the park a picnic yeah
three women a wean
and a man who don't scare
well not too easily...
as long as the swings
don't make him queasily
up the slide ok wee girl
she's gonna fall my toes all curl
nope she seems to have it dialled
little hurricane dynamo child
then the swings
for about12 seconds
three turns on the roundabout
maybe less I reckon
then back to the slide
God I am puffed
hasn't the wee girl had enough?
Ok I grab achicken roll
two bites its in a muddy hole
this picnic is turning out to be
endurance playing for Jeremy
tried the kids swing I got jammed
like wearing steel Y-fronts
my privates were crammed
ok so it was all my choice
I say in a funny high-pitched voice
"Jesus go up" I am told so I go
Only she calls me that now you know
where she got it who can guess
got an idea won't confess
(better than being a skinny Welsh Tw*t)
starting to flag like I smoked a ***
need an emergency sicky bag
go home soon and lie down quick
after picnic and playing I am quite sick
Mar 3, 2011
Mar 3, 2011 at 7:55 AM UTC
The City of Derby holds her breath amidst the crisis of historical ramblings and talkative expressions of inhibition.
Do not be deceived. Roaches are not mere insects, but are also three-course celebrations of haunting and religious engagements. There are Peaks which lie beyond the stratospheres of Leek.
Although the parameters of yesteryear project their own splendour, let us acknowledge the silver hair which drips with eternal statements of antagonistic adoration in Curzon Street.
Oh, rose of Sharon, in my sheer lack of understanding, I do not invalidate those instructions to depart from Birmingham New Street.
I have deeply immersed myself in Welsh pools of genuine loss, and have found a precious commodity which I had never beheld in former lifetimes.
Furthermore, I lament the loss of such generational integrity.
Dec 25, 2013
Dec 25, 2013 at 12:25 AM UTC
i.
Today, O' today
I got her letter in the mail;
Filled with pictures of mine
Queen, she sent me
Poems done by me, in her
Calligraphy.
ii.
Today O' today
I got lipstick kisses on
Her notes, the red stood
Out of all she wrote;
As her amour was
So fine.
iii.
Today O' today
Anon mine spirit's soared,
That fashionable vellum
O' I adored. O' Jane Sardua,
O' Jane of Earl. O' rose of Asia;
The Luzon's pearl.
iv.
Today O' today
I smiled again, because mine lover,
And mine best friend. Her ardent sonnet
Displayed her touch, grabbing mine soul,
In heaven's blush, silently tear's came to
a rush; from joy's overtaking.
v.
Today O' today
O'er the blue, I made mine stay.
Consatero, ah veray,
Queen Jane, Queen Jane,
Of Asia's praise;
Today O' today
How I fell in
Love again.
©,Brandon Nagley
©Lonesome poets poetry
©Earl Jane Nagley dedicated ( àgapi mou)
Mar 21, 2016
Mar 21, 2016 at 10:53 PM UTC
A seventies child
Born in Wales, one of the four
Countries of The UK.
I remember brown as the colour
of the day.
Fabric embossed wallpaper
all the neighbours names, who married who,
who was carrying on, the alcoholic, the beaten wives,
Even, get this the peadophiles (or kiddy fiddlers as was known)
Dai the milk, Mair the bread, the shop of infinite items.
Rugby practice for dad, baking for mam
(Cake and babies) gossip over the garden hedge
Fish on a Friday a Sunday roast, hot sweet tea.
Bubble and squeak, post delivered before you
left for school. Mist on the mountain, dew on the grass.
Welsh valley life, sounds idyllic
but scratch the surface and a darker colour
than brown emerges. Petty squablings leading to
familial feuds, the Williamses don't get on with
the Joneses, and as for the Pritchards, less said the better.
School, local, no not for me. I was sent to a Welsh
School, taught and learnt the language denied to my
Parents by English politics. Cat amongst the pigeons there.
Did I think I was special? Ideas above her station. That's what
the neighbours say.
Well, you all had the option.
Dr Forbes FRCS
Delivered babies buried men and women
Loved by all, especially his lollipop sweets.
I wasn't a child to get ***** or rip wrapping paper
off of gifts, I liked to go under the stairs (like Harry Potter)
and read. I left the dirt for my sister born 4 years later.
Then in 1982 came my brother, tidy my mother describes it.
'74,'78,'82 poor dad to have to wait I say!
More pubs than chapels, more walking than driving
more rain than sun, more music than ever was sung.
The '80's came, and we had strikes, no electric, candles
toast made with a toasting fork over the fire.
No mines, no steel, no jobs.
Picket lines, dole queues, women in work
latchkey kids, Thatcherism, ******* times.
Falklands war, IRA bombs, Royal weddings
Tory rule
But, the fire in the dragon never went out
and Tom Jones still sings his heart out.
Cymru cysglyd gwlad y gân, deffrwch
nawr, dyma'ch tro.
May 15, 2014
May 15, 2014 at 4:27 PM UTC
High on the mountain, overlooking the valley,
the valley where I was born, is a wooden bench.
Standing to attention are the bottom of the deep V
are houses, all the same, all in a row.
From the bench the village can be watched
It's comings and goings, the neighbours gossiping
talking about nothing and everything.
Everyone is there down below,
John the butcher, Dai the milk, Mair the bread,
Oliver's shop, where anything and everything was for sale.
A picturesque Welsh valley, where everyone is actually
Psychotic, and where you'll never leave except in a coffin feet first.
Those of us that get out, stay out.
Old feuds still burn, families not talking,
not remembering how it started.
Chocolate box prettiness masks the tension,
the hate, the jealousies, the negativity held
in the ***** of the valley.
How green was my valley?
It wasn't green, it's colour was red, like a hell fire.
Oh, the trees were green, the mountain was glorious
but that valley was poison.
Jun 7, 2014
Jun 7, 2014 at 12:24 PM UTC
When I ordered Welsh Rabbit, a rabbit wasn't included.
The restaurant ripped me off, that was what I concluded.
All that I was served was some cheese on toast.
I soon learned that the chef wasn't a nice host.
I wanted a rabbit and that was what I demanded.
He threw me out the door because he said I needed to be reprimanded.
i was upset at that chef so I decided to enter his restaurant again.
When he was through I thought they'd have to call my next of kin.
He burned my **** with his stove and hit my head with a frying pan.
I soon learned that when that chef gets riled, he's a dangerous man.
If you order Welsh Rabbit at his restaurant and ask for a rabbit, he will say no.
And for your own safety you should leave his restaurant peacefully, just let it go.
Mar 24, 2018
Mar 24, 2018 at 11:08 AM UTC
A normal man
Wilt sayeth a simple goodbye, on his deathbed;
A poetic man wilt recite
Poetry in his dying breathe's
©Brandon Nagley
©Lonesome poet's poetry
©DEDPOET DEDICATION
Sep 25, 2015
Sep 25, 2015 at 8:58 AM UTC
Father's Day was yesterday.
But why must a day be set aside to show a parent love?
I love my parents all year round
I've fought, screamed, cried all the while loving them.
But, my country breeds strong independent people
national identity to be found everywhere.
From the hilltop spring to the coast
we Welsh are a mystical breed, of mystery and sorcery.
My anthem "Mae hen wlad fy nhadau"
or Land of my fathers made me stop and think,
think of my father and other men in this land.
Rough handed, hewn from steel and coal.
Iron willed, fiercely proud.
Valley born I am, even now I'm in a city.
But when I die Valley dead I'll lie.
In my father's plot, set aside for us.
Set aside on a green mountain overlooking the valley.
The land of my fathers, the land that bred him and me.
This poem is in English oh "uch a fi"
But if I write in Welsh my father will not understand
His generation denied the language of song, poetry,
and identity. I have a happy heart "calon hapus"
For he and I will be forever tied by blood and country.
Father's Day for me and all children born of woman lay claim to
Father's Day all year round.
Jun 15, 2014
Jun 15, 2014 at 8:18 PM UTC
ewe wanna learn how to talk tidy
like all us welsh valley folk do
we don't know a coat from a jacket
we don't know a boot from a shoe
we live up the road down by there
shoulder length cropped curly hair
got permanent jobs on the fiddle
two houses,and mines in the middle
my mothers a tea total binger
blonde headed brunette called ginger
she always go out for a night in
to bingo she finds exciting
did you see that wind?
hear that snow?watch that song?
who's coat is that jacket?
and there it was....gone
Mar 5, 2010
Mar 5, 2010 at 12:31 PM UTC
Men of the Twenty-first
Up by the Chalk Pit Wood,
Weak with our wounds and our thirst,
Wanting our sleep and our food,
After a day and a night --
God, shall we ever forget!
Beaten and broke in the fight,
But sticking it -- sticking it yet.
Trying to hold the line,
Fainting and spent and done,
Always the thud and the whine,
Always the yell of the ***
Northumerland, Lancaster, York,
Durham and Somerset,
Fighting alone, worn to the bone,
But sticking it -- sticking it yet.
Never a message of hope!
Never a word of cheer!
Fronting Hill 70's shell-swept slope,
With the dull dead plain in our rear.
Always the whine of the shell,
Always the roar of its burst,
Always the tortures of hell,
As waiting and wincing we cursed
Our luck and the guns and the Boche,
When our Corporal shouted, "Stand to!"
And I heard some one cry, "Clear the front for the Guards!"
And the Guards came through.
Our throats they were parched and hot,
But Lord, if you'd heard the cheers!
Irish and Welsh and Scot,
Coldstream and Grenadiers.
Two brigades, if you please,
Dressing as straight as a hem,
We -- we were down on our knees,
Praying for us and for them!
Lord, I could speak for a week,
But how could you understand!
How should your cheeks be wet,
Such feelin's don't come to you.
But when can me or my mates forget,
When the Guards came through?
"Five yards left extend!"
It passed from rank to rank.
Line after line with never a bend,
And a touch of the London swank.
A trifle of swank and dash,
Cool as a home parade,
Twinkle and glitter and flash,
Flinching never a shade,
With the shrapnel right in their face
Doing their Hyde Park stunt,
Keeping their swing at an easy pace,
Arms at the trail, eyes front!
Man, it was great to see!
Man, it was fine to do!
It's a cot and a hospital ward for me,
But I'll tell'em in Blighty, whereever I be,
How the Guards came through.
3.1k
All right, I was Welsh. Does it matter?
I spoke a tongue that was passed on
To me in the place I happened to be,
A place huddled between grey walls
Of cloud for at least half the year.
My word for heaven was not yours.
The word for hell had a sharp edge
Put on it by the hand of the wind
Honing, honing with a shrill sound
Day and night. Nothing that Glyn Dwr
Knew was armour against the rain's
Missiles. What was descent from him?
Even God had a Welsh name:
He spoke to him in the old language;
He was to have a peculiar care
For the Welsh people. History showed us
He was too big to be nailed to the wall
Of a stone chapel, yet still we crammed him
Between the boards of a black book.
Yet men sought us despite this.
My high cheek-bones, my length of skull
Drew them as to a rare portrait
By a dead master. I saw them stare
From their long cars, as I passed knee-deep
In ewes and wethers. I saw them stand
By the thorn hedges, watching me string
The far flocks on a shrill whistle.
And always there was their eyes; strong
Pressure on me: You are Welsh, they said;
Speak to us so; keep your fields free
Of the smell of petrol, the loud roar
Of hot tractors; we must have peace
And quietness.
Is a museum
Peace? I asked. Am I the keeper
Of the heart's relics, blowing the dust
In my own eyes? I am a man;
I never wanted the drab role
Life assigned me, an actor playing
To the past's audience upon a stage
Of earth and stone; the absurd label
Of birth, of race hanging askew
About my shoulders. I was in prison
Until you came; your voice was a key
Turning in the enormous lock
Of hopelessness. Did the door open
To let me out or yourselves in?
3.1k
High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam
Islanded in Severn stream;
The bridges from the steepled crest
Cross the water east and west.
The flag of morn in conqueror's state
Enters at the English gate:
The vanquished eve, as night prevails,
Bleeds upon the road to Wales.
Ages since the vanquished bled
Round my mother's marriage-bed;
There the ravens feasted far
About the open house of war:
When Severn down to Buildwas ran
Coloured with the death of man,
Couched upon her brother's grave
That Saxon got me on the slave.
The sound of fight is silent long
That began the ancient wrong;
Long the voice of tears is still
That wept of old the endless ill.
In my heart it has not died,
The war that sleeps on Severn side;
They cease not fighting, east and west,
On the marches of my breat.
Here the truceless armies yet
Trample, rolled in blood and sweat;
They **** and **** and never die;
And I think that each is I.
None will part us, none undo
The knot that makes one flesh of two,
Sick with hatred, sick with pain,
Strangling--When shall we be slain?
When shall I be dead and rid
Of the wrong my father did?
How long, how long, till ***** and hearse
Puts to sleep my mother's curse?
3.1k
I could lie in bed
through the whole, long morning
but as the gentle, Welsh sun peeks through the crack between my curtains,
I stretch my legs
Dec 7, 2015
Dec 7, 2015 at 5:59 PM UTC
Iago Prytherch his name, though, be it allowed,
Just an ordinary man of the bald Welsh hills,
Who pens a few sheep in a gap of cloud.
Docking mangels, chipping the green skin
From the yellow bones with a half-witted grin
Of satisfaction, or churning the crude earth
To a stiff sea of clods that glint in the wind—
So are his days spent, his spittled mirth
Rarer than the sun that cracks the cheeks
Of the gaunt sky perhaps once in a week.
And then at night see him fixed in his chair
Motionless, except when he leans to gob in the fire.
There is something frightening in the vacancy of his mind.
His clothes, sour with years of sweat
And animal contact, shock the refined,
But affected, sense with their stark naturalness.
Yet this is your prototype, who, season by season
Against siege of rain and the wind's attrition,
Preserves his stock, an impregnable fortress
Not to be stormed, even in death's confusion.
Remember him, then, for he, too, is a winner of wars,
Enduring like a tree under the curious stars.
2.8k
A privet hedge..a broken gate the House with a roof tiled with Welsh slate,
a broken half open window from which the light throws shadows on the lawn..G'awn be off with you a Cockney voice shouts out.
The Camera pans.
A street,quite neat and real rare around these parts..two lovers on the corner sharing hearts..as if they could beat as one..
Move on there movie man the cop shouts from the black and tan.
The camera pans.
Traffic light that's stuck on green..a crowd gathers." I've never seen the like "..An old girls cry.."Someone will get hurt or even die,call the police "..as if they would bother their fat *** cans..
The camera pans.
It spins and spins upon its pins and captures you and me..and writes in Avatars of cars and flouting clouds of blues and whites,which balance out the unfilmed nights when cameras close their cyclop eyes and digitals tell no more lies.
I rise early like a bird..I heard a camera crew is coming down to film some scenes in my home town.
An expectant hush
An excited rush and then
The camera pans.
Nov 26, 2012
Nov 26, 2012 at 1:34 PM UTC
'But that was nothing to what things came out
From the sea-caves of Criccieth yonder.'
'What were they? Mermaids? dragons? ghosts?'
'Nothing at all of any things like that.'
'What were they, then?'
'All sorts of queer things,
Things never seen or heard or written about,
Very strange, un-Welsh, utterly peculiar
Things. Oh, solid enough they seemed to touch,
Had anyone dared it. Marvellous creation,
All various shapes and sizes, and no sizes,
All new, each perfectly unlike his neighbour,
Though all came moving slowly out together.'
'Describe just one of them.'
'I am unable.'
'What were their colours?'
'Mostly nameless colours,
Colours you'd like to see; but one was puce
Or perhaps more like crimson, but not purplish.
Some had no colour.'
'Tell me, had they legs?'
'Not a leg or foot among them that I saw.'
'But did these things come out in any order?'
What o'clock was it? What was the day of the week?
Who else was present? How was the weather?'
'I was coming to that. It was half-past three
On Easter Tuesday last. The sun was shining.
The Harlech Silver Band played Marchog Jesu
On thrity-seven shimmering instruments
Collecting for Caernarvon's (Fever) Hospital Fund.
The populations of Pwllheli, Criccieth,
Portmadoc, Borth, Tremadoc, Penrhyndeudraeth,
Were all assembled. Criccieth's mayor addressed them
First in good Welsh and then in fluent English,
Twisting his fingers in his chain of office,
Welcoming the things. They came out on the sand,
Not keeping time to the band, moving seaward
Silently at a snail's pace. But at last
The most odd, indescribable thing of all
Which hardly one man there could see for wonder
Did something recognizably a something.'
'Well, what?'
'It made a noise.'
'A frightening noise?'
'No, no.'
'A musical noise? A noise of scuffling?'
'No, but a very loud, respectable noise ---
Like groaning to oneself on Sunday morning
In Chapel, close before the second psalm.'
'What did the mayor do?'
'I was coming to that.'
2.8k
There is a certain mystique about Essex County where Wiccan boutiques smite the eyes with linguistic confusion.
Salaam reminds me of cold meat and Shalom reminds me of Welsh breakfasts even though the 1700s knew nothing of peace.
So, now that we almost reach the threshold of Spring Aequus Nox, I commend Julius Caesar for his respect towards atmospheric refraction.
We need to talk.
Come on, and let us delve into classical and mythological philosophies where games of death are an aphrodisiac with a sprinkling of risqué.
Feb 26, 2014
Feb 26, 2014 at 10:36 PM UTC
With a Jewish religion and a German Queen,
Who has a clue where the Brits have been?
Mum’s clan were Huguenots,
Dad’s maybe Welsh.
Lots of Africans in our football teams.
Keep out those immigrants many do say,
Even those whose parents came from Bombay.
We’ve lots of patriots from Pakistan:
The younger generation, Brits to a man.
But some are Radicals I hear you say,
We should be sending them on their way,
Back to Asia where they belong,
To the tunes of a UKIP song.
So what is “British” we must ask,
For this is not an easy task.
Justice and Democracy I hear you shout,
Tiny islands with some clout.
Shakespeare, Beatles, Rugby Lions,
Churchill clapping foes in irons.
Let’s be glad that we are free
And settle down to a cuppa tea.
Paul Butters
Nov 4, 2015
Nov 4, 2015 at 5:47 AM UTC
Matrilineality is the tracing of descent
through the female line corresponding
to a societal system in which each person
is identified with their matriline;
– their _mother's_ image –
and which can involve the inheritance
of property and/or titles. A matriline is
a line of descent from
a common female ancestor
to a descendant of either ***
in which the individuals in all intervening
generations are mothers –
in other words, a "mother line".
In matrilineal descent,
individuals belong to the same
group as their mother.
The matriline of historical nobility
was also called the _enatic_ or _Uterine_ ancestry;
From Middle English wombe, wambe,
from Old English womb, wamb
(“belly, stomach; bowels; heart; womb; hollow”),
from Proto-Germanic *wambō
(“belly, stomach, abdomen”),
from Proto-Indo-European *wamp- (“membrane (of bowels),
intestines, womb”). Cognate with Scots wam, wame (“womb”),
Dutch wam (“dewlap of beef; belly of a fish”),
German Wamme, Wampe (“paunch, belly”),
Danish vom (“belly, paunch, rumen”),
Swedish våmb (“belly, stomach, rumen”),
Norwegian vomb (“belly”), Icelandic vömb
(“belly, abdomen, stomach”), Old Welsh gumbelauc (“womb”),
Breton gwamm (“woman, wife”),
Sanskrit वपा (vapā́, “the skin or membrane
lining the intestines or parts of the viscera,
the caul or omentum”).
Aug 22, 2018
Aug 22, 2018 at 10:37 PM UTC