The Poetry of Wales

by Unknown

AN ADDRESS TO THE SUMMER.

By Dafydd ap Gwilym.

[Dafydd ap Gwilym was the son of Gwilym Gam, of Brogynin, in the parish of Llanbadarn Fawr, Cardiganshire, and was born about the year 1340. The bard was of illustrious lineage, and of handsome person. His poetical talent and personal beauty procured him the favourable notice of the fair sex; which, however, occasioned him much misfortune. His attachments were numerous, and one to Morvydd, the daughter of Madog Lawgam, of Niwbwrch, in Anglesea, a Welsh chieftain, caused the bard to be imprisoned. This lady was the subject of a great portion of the bard’s poems. Dafydd ap Gwilym has been styled the Petrarch of Wales. He composed some 260 poems, most of which are sprightly, figurative, and pathetic. The late lamented Arthur James Johnes, Esquire, translated the poems of Dafydd ap Gwilym into English. They are very beautiful, and were published by Hooper, Pall Mall, in 1834. The bard, after leading a desultory life, died in or about the year 1400.]

Thou summer! so lovely and gay,
Ah! whither so soon art thou gone?
The world will attend to my lay
While thy absence I sadly bemoan:
With flow’rs hast thou cherish’d the glade,
The fair orchard with opening buds,—
The hedge-rows with darkening shade,
And with verdure the meadows and woods.

How calm in the vale by the brook—
How blithe o’er the lawn didst thou rove,
To prepare the fresh bow’r in the nook
For the damsel whose wishes were love:
When, smiling with heaven’s bright beam,
Thou didst paint every hillock and field,
And reflect, in the smooth limpid stream,
All the elegance nature could yield.

Perfuming the rose on the bush,
And arching the eglantine spray,
Thou wast seen by the blackbird and thrush,
And they chanted the rapturous lay:
By yon river that bends o’er the plain,
With alders and willows o’erhung,
Each warbler perceiv’d the glad strain,
And join’d in the numerous song.

Here the nightingale perch’d on the throne,
The poet and prince of the grove,
Inviting the lingering morn,
Taught the bard the sweet descant of love:
And there, from the brake by the rill,
When night’s sober steps have retir’d,
Ten thousand gay choristers thrill
Sweet confusion with rapture inspir’d.

Then the maiden, conducted by May,
Persuasive adviser of love,
With smiles that would rival the ray,
Nimbly trips to the bow’r in the grove;
Where sweetly I warble the song
Which beauty’s soft glances inspire;
And, while melody flows from my tongue,
My soul is enrapt with desire.

But how sadly revers’d is the strain!
How doleful! since thou art away;
Every copse, every hillock and plain,
Has been mourning for many a day:
My bow’r, on the verge of the glade,
Where I sported in rapturous ease,
Once the haunt of the delicate maid—
She forsakes it, and—how can it please?

Nor blame I the damsel who flies,
When winter with threatening gale,
Loudly howls through the dark frozen skies,
And scatters the leaves o’er the vale:

In vain to the thicket I look
For the birds that enchanted the fair,
Or gaze on the wide-spreading oak;
No shelter, no music, is there.

But tempests, with hideous yell,
Chase the mist o’er the brow of the hill,
And grey torrents in every dell
Deform the soft murmuring rill:
And the hail, or the sleet, or the snow,
On winter’s hard mandate attends:
To banishment, hence may they go—
Earth’s tyrants, and destiny’s friend!

But thou, glorious summer, return,
And visit the destitute plains;
Nor suffer thy poet to mourn,
Unheeded, in languishing strains:
O! come on the wings of the breeze,
And open the bloom of the thorn;
Display thy green robe o’er the trees,
And all nature with beauty adorn.

’Midst the bow’rs of the fresh blooming May,
Where the odours of violets float,
Each bird, on his quivering spray,
Will remember his sprightliest note:
Then the golden hair’d lass, with a song,
Will deign to revisit the grove;
Then, too, my harp shall be strung,
To welcome the season of love.

SONG TO ARVON.

By the Rev. Evan Evans.

[The poem from which the following translation is extracted was composed by the Rev. Evan Evans, a Clergyman of the Church of England, better known by his bardic name of Ieuan Glan Geirionydd. He was born in 1795 at a freehold of his father, situate on the banks of the river Geirionydd, in Carnarvonshire, and died in 1855. He composed a great number of poems on different subjects, religious and patriotic, several of which obtained prizes at Eisteddfodau, and one on the Resurrection gained the chair or principal prize. This poet’s compositions are distinguished by great elegance, sweetness and pathos, and are much esteemed in the Principality. Several of them have been set to music.]

Where doth the cuckoo early sing,
In woodland, dell and valley?
Where streamlets deep o’er rocky cliffs
Form cataracts so lofty?
On Snowdon’s summits high,
In Arvon’s pleasant county.

Flocks of thousand sheep are fed
Upon its mountains rugged,
Her pastures green and meadows fair
With cattle-herds are studded,
Deep are the lakes in Arvon’s vales
Where fish in shoals are landed.

The shepherd’s soft and mellow voice
Is heard upon her mountain,
Where oft he hums his rustic song
To his beloved maiden,
Resounding through the gorges deep
With bleat of sheep and oxen.

On Arvon’s rock-bound shore doth break
The surge in fretful murmur,
And oft when stirr’d by tempest high
The ocean speaks in thunder,

Spreading through town and village wide
Dismay, despair and fear.

* * * * *

The sun is glorious when it breaks
The gloom of morning darkness,
Sweet are the leaves and flowers of May
Succeeding winter’s baldness,
Yet fairer than the whole to me
Are Arvon’s maids so guile-less.

If to the sick there is delight
To heal of his affliction,
If to the traveller’s weary sight
Sweet is the destination,
Than all these sweeter far to me
The hills and dales of Arvon.

Had I the wings and speed of morn
To skim o’er mount and valley,
I’d hie o’er earth and sea direct
To Arvon’s genial country,
And there in peace would end my days,
Far from deceit and envy.