A Welsh Testament

 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?

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