The foam-flakes are whirling
    Below on the strand,
  As white as the pages
    I turn with my hand;
  And the curlew afar,
    From his storm-troubled lair,
  Laments with the cry
    Of a soul in despair. 
  Our Father, forget not
    Our mariners’ state;
  Their ships are so slender,
    Thy seas are so great.

A FLOWER-SUNDAY LULLABY

(After Eifion Win, the contemporary Welsh poet)

  Though the blue slab hides our laddy,
    Slumber, free of fear! 
  Well we know it, I and daddy,
    Naught can harm you here. 
  You and all the little sleepers,
    Their small graves within,
  Have bright angels for door-keepers. 
    Sleep, Goronwy Wyn!

  Ah, too well I now remember,
    Darling, when you slept,
  How the children from your chamber
    Jealously I kept. 
  Now how willingly to wake you
    I would let them in,
  If their merry noise could make you
    Move, Goronwy Wyn!

  Sleep, though mother is not near you,
    In God’s garden green! 
  Flower-Sunday gifts we bear you,
    Lovely to be seen;
  Six small primroses to show us
    Summer-time is ours;
  Though, alas! locked up below us,
    Lies our flower of flowers.

  Sleep! to mother’s love what matters
    Passing time or tide? 
  On my ear your footstep patters,
    Still my babe you bide. 
  All the others moving, moving,
    Still disturb my breast;
  But the dead have done with roving,
    You alone have rest.

  Then, beneath the primrose petals,
    Sleep, our heart’s delight! 
  Darkness o’er us deeply settles;
    We must say “Good night!”
  Your new cradle needs no shaking
    On its quiet floor. 
  Sleep, my child! till you are waking
    In my arms once more.

THE BALLAD OF THE OLD BACHELOR OF TY’N Y MYNYDD

(After W.J.  Gruffydd, 1880- , one of the leading “New Bards”)

  Strongest swept his sickle through the whin-bush,
    Straightest down the ridge his furrows sped;
  Early on the mountain ranged his reapers,
    Above his mattock late he bowed his head.

  Love’s celestial rapture once he tasted,
    Then a cloud of suffering o’er him crept. 
  Out along the uplands, in the dew-fall,
    He mourned the maid who in the churchyard slept,

  With the poor he shared his scanty earnings,
    To the Lord his laden heart he breathed;
  On his rustic heart fell two worlds’ sunshine,
    And two worlds’ blossoms round his footsteps wreathed.

  Much he gloried in Young Gwalia’s doings,
    Yet more dearly loved her early lore,
  Catching ever from her Triple Harpstrings
    The far, faint echoes of her ancient shore.