Translations into English Verse from the Poems of Davyth ap Gwilym/The Bard declares
THE BARD
DECLARES THAT HUNCHBACK (EITHIG) HAS DESTROYED MORVYTH’S BEAUTY BY HIS BREATH.
It is my purpose to resign
The girl of clear and brilliant cheek,
And gestures modest, kind, and meek—
With grief so fearfully I pine,
That all my powers of mind decline!
The world will deem me wise to shun
The maid who in the birks was won,
And to renounce my hopeless suit,
It is a labour without fruit;
For her complexion’s radiant glow,
With deep intensity of woe,
Has been discoloured long ago!
I can not nerve with strength the weak—
And who can beautify the cheek?
For sickness, and; alas! for care,
She never can again be fair;
The smoke from Eithig’s mouth that reeks
Such havoc, on her features wreaks,
And, like the fumes of burning peat,
Sullies soft Enid’s[1] features sweet!
An image of frail alder made,
By Saxon workman soon decays,
Robbed of its varnish—if displayed
By the full lamp’s polluting blaze;
The cloth of England soon is soiled
By the peat fire—the sun is spoiled
By mists that gather in the sky
Of all his power and brilliancy;
A chair of oak—high soaring tree—
Crumbles to dust beside the sea!
When brightest shone her mien divine,
A transient stewardship was mine,
But in her charms—O fatal chance!
I have not an inheritance!
Well does the wretch know how to mar
Features as fair as Morvyth’s are!
Eithig, the dark, cold, ruthless wight,
Would rather that they were not bright;
Still with his mouth’s destructive haze
He blasts her beauty’s radiant blaze!
With bitterness of heart I mourn
Her faded form by anguish worn;
But worn and blighted, shrunk and sear,
Still will that form to me be dear!
God and St. Cadvan save her still,
In this extremity of ill;
In truth, she wants heav’n’s guardian care,
In this her need—she was too fair!
- ↑ ‘Enid,’ the name of a celebrated beauty, often applied poetically by Davyth ap Gwilym to Morvyth.