(By his Father, Lewis Glyn Cothi, 1425-1486)
| One wee son, woe
worth his sire! My treasure was and heart's desire; But evermore I now must pine, Mourning for that wee son of mine, Sick to the heart, day out and in, Thinking and thinking of Johnny Glynn, My fairy prince for ever fled, Leaving life's Mabinogion dead. A rosy apple, pebbles white, And dicky-birds were his delight, A childish bow with coloured cord, A little brittle wooden sword. From bagpipes or the bogy-man Into his mother's arms he ran, There coaxed from her a ball to throw With his daddy to and fro. His own sweet songs he'd then be singing, Then for a nut with a shout be springing; Holding my hand he'd trot about with me, Coax me now, and now fall out with me, Now, make it up again, lip to lip, For a dainty die or a curling chip. Would God my lovely little lad A second life, like Lazarus, had! St. Beuno raised from death at once St. Winifred and her six nuns; Would to God the Saint could win An eighth from death in Johnny Glynn! Ah, Mary! my merry little knave, Coffined and covered in the grave! To think of him beneath the slab [81] Deals my lone heart a double stab. Bright dream beyond my own life's shore, Proud purpose of my future's store, My hope, my comfort from annoy, My jewel and my glowing joy, My nest of shade from out the sun, My lark, my soaring, singing one, My golden shaft of faithful love Shot at the radiant round above, My intercessor with Heaven's King, My boyhood's second blossoming, My little, laughing, loving John, For you I'm sunk in shadow wan! Good-bye, good-bye, for evermore My little lively squirrel's store, The happy bouncing of his ball, His carol up and down the hall! Adieu, my little dancing one, Adieu, adieu, my son, my son! |
THE NOBLE'S GRAVE
(After Sion Cent, 1386-1420, priest of Kentchurch, in Hereford)
| Premier Peer but
yesterday, Lone within the tomb to-morrow; For his silken garments gay, Grave-clothes in a gravelled furrow. No love-making, homage none; From his mines no golden mintage; No rich traffic in the sun; No more purple-purling vintage. No more usherings out of Hall By obsequious attendant; No more part, however small, In the Pageant's pomp resplendent! Just a perch of churchyard clay All the soil he now possesses; Heavily its burthen grey On his pulseless bosom presses. |