Welsh Journals

As once we were, would that we yet could be Together, in this life, fantastic fair Of shapes that densely dance, like motes in air, And likewise vanish I have need of thee Who, in this world of sorry slaves, art free, Canst comfort one, whose portion is despair, With thoughts of something marvellously fair Beyond the veil that waits for thee and me. Were men the sport of gods, as sung of yore, Thine is a soul unsullied and serene, And I would with thee to the fatal shore Where we might curse the crime that we had seen, Or else, if so, with reverence might adore The hand that fashioned us what we had been. And thou couldst bear with him who is the child Of inward strife, of storm and loneliness, Whose trivial triumphs bring but bitterness Because by cursed necessity defiled. Sweet Nature is the sweetest in its wild And rugged, unregarded loveliness, 'Tis what it looks, and neither more nor less, For ever to itself 'tis reconciled And have we need to do whate'er we may To win the wonder of a pack of fools, Or yet to earn a pittance in the pay Of those who fain would count us with their tools, And shape us for the bearing of their sway, Whether by means of churches, courts or schools ? Are there not sometimes golden hours that steal Upon us like the sleep of innocence ? What never-known or long-forgotten sense Within is stirred when, suddenly, we feel The sundered fetters falling, and we reel, Half dreading iest we lose such joy intense, Or lest it be but some new violence Of fate's relentless, ever-turning wheel ? And how these golden hours' diviner light Renews the faded world's forgotten youth, Streams through the darkness of its dreadful night, Makes forms of beauty out of shapes uncouth Seems yet above to show the throne of Right, Yet to reveal the reign of living Truth And have we two not watched this light divine With purity and beauty clothe the skies ? (Have I not seen it oft illume thy eyes When dull with care and hopelessness were mine ?) Where is that land where it must ever shine- Elysium, Tir-na-nOg, or Paradise, Where we might happy be, and pure and wise, And young and beautiful beyond decline Oh youth and beauty, in their loveliness Can sin or evil never find a place Twere heaven to know that we might yet possess, Death past, in this the cradle of our race, Its Tir-na-nOg, that dream of blessedness, Which fools may mock, but never can efface. MEMORIES OF MENAI (TO TWO FRIENDS). Along the banks of Menai, wandering,- Menai, the ever young and ever old, That day, it was of silver streaked with gold, Set in the emerald of late-coming spring,- We went together would that I could sing The spirit of that hour and place, unfold The rapture that must ever be untold, Unless thy music forth its soul may bring Sitting beside the Church of Magdalene, That slumbers in the lonely fields afar, We saw decay and death where life had been, And felt what futile, fleeting things we are Around the dead of ages, trees are green, And waves for ever moan upon the bar. But now, my friend, the golden hour is fled, The darkness gathers, deep and still again Is all the longing of the soul in vain, Are trees and waves alive, the spirit dead ? Methinks there should be mocking overhead If our best thoughts are figments of the brain If otherwise, what centuries of pain Must pass, ere forth one ray of light is shed? Are we the dreams of gods that are no more, Doomed to the same eternal nothingness ? Or is there yet, to reverence and adore, A Father who will all our wrongs redress, Will show that all the fancied ills we bore Were parts of uncompleted blessedness ? II. What though I now alone be left among The grandeurs of our classic heritage, Seeking the echo of another age That loved and fighting fell and lingered long? What though I sing the wild, unfettered song Of lone Eryri 's tempests when they wage Their wars until the cloud of writhing rage Is torn and hurled in broken mist along The smoking ridges, thickening on the strand Of Menai, Menai of the many moods,- Enchanting Mona, from whose fertile land, Beneath the mass of pallid cloud, exudes A sinuous haze, and, merging, both expand Dim Mona's fields to endless solitudes Vain were the song, for no accustomed ear, Thine lacking, here might recognise the strain, Nor other heart respond it all were vain. He who, once mute, yet sang whilst thou wert near The lay he learnt ere life turned sad and sere, Shall sing no more unless thou come again, Thou child of storm and sunshine, wind and rain, Who hast a brother, but hast no compeer; So let my soul laugh with the frantic storms Of wild Eryri, proud Eryri mine, Nor seek to lure their spirits into forms, Nor more in rhyme their raptures to confine, But only live, like unto birds and worms, And, dying, life to air and earth resign T. Gwynn Jones