Tales of the Rhymney Valley

Turn the pages, slowly, with the touch of fairies
And lo, between the leaves you spy…
Lovers sleeping in heather, stars-a-skylarking, and bells
Endlessly pealing in Pwll Cylla,
Sounding the love of Gwladus across the valley of years.

Only listen, and in the wind’s kiss, swaying the catkins,
Far-off Morlais can be heard, and the Severn’s mermaid song.

This is the dream you enter, peopled with Giants,
Haunted with dog-like steps, the spectral pale of banshees,
Envy, trapped in a green eternity, and sad hunchbacks.

Restored, straight and tall in the moon’s shadow,
Hobmen-scheming their antics – defying a goblin’s rancour,
Youth is eternal here, and hooded poachers,
Moonlight, furtive, run scared from the rabbits’ dizzy dance.
No devil’s triumph sung, no braggart’s boast
Echoed across canyons, no lovers left, unquiet.
Yearning, weeping rivers like the trees of sad Sannan’s

Vale: here, in these tales, fired in the mind’s black rock,
All evils are vanquished in the kingdom of kindness; and giants,
Lolling in one-eyed sloth, are hoodwinked by little boys’ guile.
Learnt from fairies,
Even now, as you turn to a new page,
You can hear them, garlanded in yellow broom, laughing…

PETER K. MORGAN

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