John Fish B.Sc.
Publishers of Tenby in Wales (UK)TENBY LITERARY FESTIVAL
PRESELI BLUESTONES
INTERNET SUBSCRIPTION CHANNELStar of Wales Poetry Anthology
(Publisher's note: This anthology contains hyperlinks to enable you to easily navigate betweeen the index and poems)
Men of Harlech by Richard Raymond III
Rorke's Drift by Richard Raymond III
... Men Of The Tattered Battalion by Richard Raymond III
The Spirit of Glyndwyr by Richard Raymond III
The Meadow by Colin Morris
Y Ddôl gan Colin Morris
A Summer Sigh by Anna-Marie Docherty
Coastal Worship by Anna-Marie Docherty
Men of Harlech
by
Richard Raymond III
(Though I have, alas, no discernable Welsh heritage (being of distant English and French Huguenot descent), yet I have some relations - nephew and niece -living near Swansea, and have begun to conceive a great admiration for the history and people of Cymru. After listening to several stirring renditions of "Men of Harlech" on the internet, am submitting my own original lyrics. Although I'm well aware that Harlech is in Gwynedd, not Pembrokeshire, perhaps your strong national sensibilities will permit you to overlook the discrepancy, and consider them for inclusion in the Star of Pembrokeshire Poetry Anthology
. [Publisher's acknowledgment: Hence "Star of Wales Poetry Anthology"]. Am also perfectly aware of many other versions, both in English and Welsh, but I affirm that enclosed lyrics are my own, date of composition 1965 and probably inspired by 1964 film "Zulu", which featured a company of the 24th Foot "South Wales Borderers" singing defiantly in the faces of thousands of spear-waving Zulus at Rorke's Drift.)Men of Harlech, wake from slumber
Foes surround thee past all number
Doubts abound, and cares encumber
Rouse thee to the fight!
Men of Harlech, bold as giants
Strong in faith and self-reliance
Let your banners wave defiance
From the castle-height!
Fight, and never falter!
Strike, for home and altar!
For Cymru's name, nor yield to shame
Of wearing Norman halter!
Men of Harlech, gaunt and gory
While Valour lives, so lives your story
Let it ring in endless glory
Freedom, God and Right!
Rorke's Drift
An Incident of the Zulu War, 1879
by
Richard Raymond III
(In 1979 [centennial of battle] while at summer training with the 116th Infantry Brigade, Virginia Army National Guard, I had the honour of meeting Major David Jones, commanding a company of the Royal Regiment of Wales, with whom we were conducting joint training exercises at Fort Pickett, Va. I sent him a copy of "Rorke's Drift", which he kindly offered to include in a future issue of the Regiment's newsletter. )
Natal: The South African coastland
So prosperous, peaceful and green
The Boer and Briton have tamed it
A bountiful, beautiful scene
Where no living man can remember
Those distant colonial years
When England made war on the Zulu
That Day of the Washing of Spears
The land of the Zulus was fruitful
Their pastures were fertile and fair
Full reason for envy by Boers
Whose acres seemed brittle and bare
Excuse for an English encroachment
Unheeding of customs or rights
Enough to engender invasion
By coveys of covetous whites
The pudgy Queen-Empress had spoken
And continents quaked at her word
"Impede our imperial progress?
Deny our demands? How absurd!"
And columns of Redcoats went marching
Bright bayonets under the sky
Their orders were simple and savage:
The blacks shall surrender or die
[Receipt for a frightful disaster:
One governor, headstrong and sly;
One general, dull but ambitious
Great schemes for advancement thereby;
Two reinforced rifle battalions
Whose opinion of natives was slight;
And twenty-five thousand fierce Zulus
All whetting their spears for the fight!]
Well-feared was the tall Matabele
Of conquering warrior-race
Astounding in speed and endurance
In pantherlike power and grace;
Courageous and cunning in battle
Dead-loyal to kraal and to king
All man, from his horn-hardened footsole
To the topknot he wound in a ring
The king, from his kraal at Ulundi
Sent warriors forth in a flood
"Go, slaughter these whites," he commanded
"Your spears shall be washed in their blood"
And close under Isandhlwana
Where a high, rocky hillock uprose
His disciplined, terrible tribesmen
Made ready to welcome their foes
A ford on the Buffalo River
Whose waters ran yellow and swift
Was marked for a bridge and an outpost
The mission and ranch at Rorke's Drift
For bridging, one section of sappers
Three rifle platoons for a guard
A total of less than a hundred
Commanded by Bromhead and Chard
By the hillside of Isandhlwana
Ten miles up the trail from the ford
The British set up their encampment
Unvigilant, careless and bored;
The sun set on ruin and slaughter
One horrified shout of surprise
And the Redcoat battalion lay shattered
With "the blood running into their eyes" (1)
A handful of shaken survivors
Fled back down the road to the west
Four thousand victorious Zulus
Behind them relentlessly pressed
Their plumes and their assegais crimsoned (2)
A foaming black torrent was poured
Upstream, to where Chard and his Welshmen
Lay braced for the shock, at the ford
With boxes and overturned wagons
They fashioned a thin barricade
A thin line of rifles within it
Faced horrible odds, undismayed
Swept in the cold assegais, gleaming
Blazed outward the volleys of lead
Each flash of the fatal Martinis
Cut windows of wounded and dead!
Ah, that was a fight to remember
Close-quarter, and neither to yield:
The white, with his breech-loading rifle
The black, with his buffalo shield
Then Chard, hand-to-hand at the breastwork
With foes closing round in a ring
Roared out a command to his Redcoats
"Show now ye are Welshmen ... and sing!"
The tall Colour-Sergeant began it
Deep-chested, defiant and clear
While voice after voice swelled the chorus
Till all of the Zulus might hear
Magnificent old "Men of Harlech"
And into the heavens it rang
Strange counterpoint over the conflict
But ah! how the Borderers sang!
At spearpoint the farmhouse was taken
It flamed in a furious light
As on came the Zulus, by hundreds
Attacking far into the night
While snipers with captured Martinis
Fired down from a neighboring hill
And plume-waving warriors shouted
A thirst to be in at the kill!
But dawn, flaming over the hilltop
Found the Borderers still on their feet
Their bayonet-hedge still unbroken
The Zulus began their retreat
One company, eighty-odd rifles
Outfacing four thousand or more
So stoutly-sustained an engagement
Has rarely been equaled in war
Twelve Redcoats, and five hundred Zulus (3)
A quite disproportionate loss
For Bromhead and Chard, and nine soldiers
It meant a Victoria Cross;
For hearts stricken deep in disaster
It meant an immediate lift:
The slaughter at Isandhlwana
Set off by the stand at Rorke's Drift!
Victoria's Empire is vanished
No vestige remains of the kraal
The bones of both Briton and Zulu
Are dust, on the plains of Natal
Their deed, be it ever remembered
Such valour as seldom is seen:
The Zulu, defending his homeland
The Redcoat, obeying his Queen!
Author's Notes:
... Men Of The Tattered Battalion
(1)by
Richard Raymond III
"A remarkable people, the Zulus. They defeat our generals,
they convert our bishops and they settle the fate of a great
European dynasty" ... Disraeli
Author's Notes:
The Spirit of Glyndwyr
by
Richard Raymond III
The Spirit of such heroes came
Before the Island had a name
When bison roamed the heathered hills
And skin-clad men made flint-tipped kills ...
Owain Glyndwr was yet to be
But men conceived of Liberty
Ten thousand years rolled slowly by
While Welshmen kept their spirits high
Despite the Normans' castles and forts
And raids which almost ranked as sports ...
Though conquerors would soon arrive
Their enterprises did not thrive
"Ned Longshanks" held the English throne
And swore to take Wales for his own
Yet Glyndwr's Spirits soon arose
To master all of Cymru's foes
The "Men of Harlech", staunch and strong
Proclaimed defiance with a song
Far down the corridors of Time
When long-forgotten is this rhyme
That Spirit, never-failing, breathed
A flame of Liberty, bequeathed
To every Cymric man and maid ...
Fierce and unfading, unafraid!
The Meadow
by
Colin Morris
(I would say my writing could be classed as melancholic with a keen hand for realistic observation. I attempt to break through mists of confusion and look at life as it is without misconceptions.
My initial writings took place in my garden this summer. I submit my first to you in both Welsh [Y Ddôl
] and English. My grandparents were both from Wales, they both left their mother country to take up work in London after the First World War . My grandmother died after child birth in England and it is within this poem that I attempt to represent my grandfathers love for her and the family they had.)
From those valleys and hills not so far away they came, two sweet lovers, entwined and sowed from birth, through common soil
Our spirit remains deep routed in thee, we must go for now, to return some day, maybe
Rays of hope glisten ahead, for we are as one, solid as rock
The meadow we plant brings great joy, the daisies and buttercups keep us amused
The fragile tranquillity of life over looked, hits hardest when you are weak. Tears are not enough to grasp your fading memory, like dandelion seeds, one breath and you are gone, not there, forever
Why, why O lord, O mother earth, O sky above, you do take my one and only love
O god where is my strength, I need you more than ever, why O why such punishment from thee
Time ticks by and by, my flowers have drifted from the meadow, to find horizons of their own
In my mind I re-trace my steps, I grasp your hand my dear Anne, for I wish to lay down one final time and embrace you in my arms, to feel the earth on our backs
Peace at last, for we have given, a gift as precious as your sweet breath, to our loved ones above, may you always remember us and where hence we came
We were sown not so far away, amongst the green hills and mist of a golden land, in spirit we return, to lay our heads with such sweet memories of our home sown meadow.
Y Ddôl
gan
Colin Morris
O’r dyffrynnoedd a’r bryniau cyfagos hynny y daethant, dau gariad wedi’u gwau ynghyd a’u hau o’u genedigaeth yn yr un pridd
Erys ein hysbryd wedi’i wreiddio’n ddwfn ynot ti, ond rhaid mynd am y tro, gan efallai ddychwelyd rhyw dro
Mae pelydrau gobaith yn tywynnu o’n blaenau, yr ydym fel un, mor gadarn â’r graig
Mae’r ddôl a blannwn yn dwyn llawenydd mawr, gyda llygaid y dydd a blodau ymenyn yn ein diddanu
Wrth edrych dros lonyddwch brau ein bywyd, mae’r ergyd fwyaf pan fyddi di’n wan.
’Dyw dagrau ddim yn ddigon i ddal gafael ar gof ohonot sy’n cilio, fel hadau dant y llew; un anadliad a dyna ti wedi mynd am byth
Paham O Dduw, O Fam Ddaear, O Nefoedd uwchben, pam mynd â’r un a’r unig gariad oddi arnaf
O Dduw, ble mae fy nerth, rwyf dy angen yn fwy nag erioed. Pam rhoi’r fath gosb i mi
Hed amser fesul awr, crwydrodd fy mlodau o’r ddôl i geisio’u gorwelion eu hunain
Yn fy meddwl, rwy’n crwydro’n ôl, yn cydio’n dy law, fy annwyl Anne, rwyf am orwedd un tro olaf i’th gofleidio a theimlo’r pridd ar ein cefnau
Hedd o’r diwedd, rhoesom rodd mor werthfawr â’th anadl hyfryd i’r rhai a garwn uchod; boed i chi ein cofio am byth, a’r man lle daethom
Cawsom ein hau gerllaw, ymysg y bryniau gwyrdd a’r niwl yng ngwlad yr hud; mewn ysbryd y dychwelwn, i roi ein pennau i lawr yn llawn atgofion melys am y ddôl a heuwyd gennym.
A Summer Sigh
by
Anna-Marie Docherty
(I was inspired to write this poem after a visit to Broad Haven and in particular Little Haven during their promote the area week [June 2010]. It was walking around the artworks exhibition, the gallery and shops, together with beaches and campsites that made me want take this further, especially seeing how driftwoods, shells and other materials from the area were being used to bring in a living for the local folk.)
The lush of the land lies as velvet moss green carpet
The river rushing its morning wash
Rumbling as it spins twisting and turning its tidal path
Over the chance carried stones to the sea
Where the coastal sands of time are met
Meeting waves pulled by undercurrents
Finding rocks, kale, seaweed and moss covered
Just as the hair of cherubs' faces foamed
Then gently adorned with shell and mollusc jewels
And salty sea air crusts crystal formations alongside
In come the tides bringing with them oceanic treasures
Driftwoods, wreckage, salvage
That have crashed and bashed the cliffs along the way
To finally rest ashore and be renewed
To become beachcombers' delights
Trinkets, gifts or items for the home.
Coastal Worship
by
Anna-Marie Docherty
(We live in Pembrokeshire, the beautiful corner of Wales bordered by mountains and coastline, this poem portraying my thoughts of the deep blue sea that surrounds us. I have a degenerative spinal condition and in the past two years have been driven to write poetry with a passion. You can find me, aka Anaisnais, on these links: Link1 Link2 Link3 Please feel free to come say hi and leave a helpful constructive comment. I'll get back to you as health/time allows, thank you.)
Thunder, whoosh, rip, curl, tumble, waves come in
Kissing, caressing the beach with mastered touch
Dredging the depths of unseen ocean's floor
Thunder, whoosh, rip, curl, tumble, waves comes in
Foam, crash, swell, smacks ship ‘gainst rocks and harbour's wall
Gulls overhead swoop and dive to snatch their feed
Thunder, whoosh, rip, curl, tumble, waves come in
Kissing, caressing the beach with mastered touch.