Mererid Hopwood

- Wales, United Kingdom, -

is the only woman to have won the three main prizes for poetry and prose in the Eisteddfod - Wales’ national cultural festival. She has been Children Laureate for Wales and was awarded the Glyndwr prize for her contribution to literature. Her collection Nes Draw won the poetry section of the Welsh language Book of the Year Awards, 2016. She writes mainly in Welsh and has degrees in Spanish and German language and literature. Mererid has taught throughout her career and is now at the University of Wales, Trinity Saint David. She has collaborated with visual artists, composers and dancers and has taken part in literature events from South America and India to Europe, including the Hay Festival and much closer home. Mererid is Chair of Cymdeithas y Cymod, the International Fellowship of Reconciliation in Wales. She lives with her family in West Wales.

More about the poet

Poetry

Winter / Gaeaf

Do not be afraid.
Let the sun touch
your deep-frozen fury
and release
the energy that transforms.
Fear not the storms,
for the calm will come.
Fear not the heat of the drum
that beats your heart
nor the heat of the hum
in your mind.
Fear nothing
but the lulling ebb that grinds smooth
the cool senses
to conform -
your indifference.
Do not be afraid
of anything else
not even the moon,
friend,
do not be afraid,
for life is without end.
Listen,
soon,
it will be dawn.
Clyw glic, clic, clic y bysedd rhew’n datgloi’r
byllt, a’r haul o’u plaid yn codi clawr
y byd, clyw’r clic, clic, clic, mae’r nos yn rhoi;

daw’r pum pelydryn gwan i araf droi’r
allwedd nes chwalu cadwyni’r llawr,
clyw glic, clic, clic y bysedd rhew’n datgloi’r

ffenestri, clic, clic, clic, daw amser codi’r toi
ac agor eto ddrysau’r ardd i sawr
holl flodau’r byd, clyw’r clic, ac mae’r nos yn rhoi;

mae’r dwylo’n gwthio’r gaeaf ac mae’r rhew fu’n cnoi
yn ildio, gwres y dydd sy’n dechrau cario nawr,
clyw glic clic clic, mae’r bysedd cry’n datgloi’r

nos, er gwaetha’r ofn, yn gwthio’r haf, sdim modd osgoi
grym eu gwthio fel geni babi i’r byd, ac fe ddaw’r
dydd, clyw’r clic, clic, clic ac mae’r nos yn rhoi,

ac mae’r byllt i gyd yn chwâl a’r meistri oer yn ffoi,
ac y mae bywyd, ac fe fydd bywyd ac fe ddaw’r wawr.
Clyw glic, clic, clic y bysedd rhew’n datgloi’r
byd i gyd. Clic! Ac mae'r nos wedi rhoi.
Coming Undone / Datod

For my shame
I boiled the smalls
and put them neat and clean on the thin line
to dance gently
to the accompaniment of the day.

In the squeak of the winch
if I heard a sigh,
I did not pause,
unfurling my flag of proud dignity,
I raised every under-garment up high,

And from the East there came nothing
except the rays of the sun to finger them,
before the morning's dry kiss baked them crisp.

I did not see the imploring of the distant hands
that had stitched them together,
nor see the thread come undone
before disappearing under rubble dust.

I saw only white and proper bargains
hanging
for my shame.

In response to RS Thomas 'Two Shirts on a Line' for the Hay Festival, reflecting on Dhaka, spring 2013
Trans: Tim ap Hywel
Rhag fy nghywilydd
berwais y dillad mân
a'u gosod yn dwt ac yn lân ar y lein denau
i ddawnsio'n dyner
i gyfeiliant y dydd.

Yng ngwich y winsh
os clywais ochenaid,
nid oedais,
codais bob pilyn isaf yn uchel,
a chwifio fy malchder yn faner fyny fry.

Ac ni ddôi o'r Dwyrain ddi
ond pelydrau'r haul i'w byseddu,
cyn i gusan sych y bore eu crasu'n grimp.

Ni welais ymbil y dwylo pell
fu'n eu pwytho'n dynn,
na gweld yr edau'n datod
cyn diflannu'n dawel, dan lwch rwbel.

Ni welais ond bargeinion propor, gwyn
yn crogi
rhag fy nghywilydd i.

Cerdd i ymateb i ‘Two Shirts on a Line’ yn nathliadau R. S. Thomas, Gwyl y Gelli, wrth fyfyrio ar Dhaka, Gwanwyn 2013
/ Wedi Cad Coludd ar Ddrain

Cynddelw Brydydd Mawr

“I should like the word ‘alien’ and ‘foreign’ be banished from the language.
We are all members of the same family.”
Charlotte Despard

The wind that shakes the memory tree wakes me.
It tears the flesh from the carcass of the mare that rides my night,
And howling, hurls it, skin and meat,
to dress the wounded branches, furious fright,
beside the bowels of my brother,
my father, my sister, my mother.
For there is no foreigner
no alien, no other.
This is the mercy of memory.
And then before me, bold, bright,
dawn’s first blade slits the day open–
and unforgotten
the tree now sliced with light’s clean knife
shows me how it grieves for the leaves of life.

Cynddelw Brydydd Mawr: a 12th Century Welsh poet – the line translates: ‘After battle I saw bowels on thorns’ … see, alas, similar descriptions of WW1 battlefields in Hochschild’s book.

For Charlotte Despard, See To End All Wars, Adam Hochschild, p. 279
Brixton Jail, 1918 / (Untitled)

A letter from Bertrand Russell

Dear Comrade,

“Agnostic is hard to spell,”

the prison warder sighed and wrote it out,
and said I’d find, once locked within my cell,
that all the Gods are one without a doubt;
not strange that my despicable offence
should echo then the Sermon on the Mount,
defying logic, cheating common sense
and telling there’s a different way to count;

but odd that, quite unlike the furious crowd
with all their godly prayers, when battle’s done
I still believe that millions in their shroud

can only count if listed one by one;

the only Mathematics fit for Wars

knows no gain just loss,

Fraternally Yours.
Hafn y Glo / Hafn y Glo

So this is Hafn y Glo.
A sharp-edged fissure on my list
between the might of Dyffryn yr Allorau
and the softness of Dôl y Plu.
Hafn y Glo.
I'm searching
on the margins of recognition
for the imprint of the fern
that stretches its fingers from the ages
before the ages that went before.
Hafn y Glo.
I'm listening for the scent of the dew,
or the whistle of the awakening in the tendril strings
at the hour when the green violin unwound its head.
Hafn y Glo
with its cold light.
Hafn y Glo,
an edge, a sword,
a cove of secrets
like an ever-existing memory.
Hafn y Glo.
There's an older name than this
in embers somewhere, I suppose.
Hafn y Glo.
It takes my breath away.

Hafn y Glo=Coal Creek Dyffryn yr Allorau =Altar Valley; Dôl y Plu =Feather Meadow: names given by the Welsh to places on the pampas
Trans: Tim ap Hywel
A dyma Hafn y Glo.
Hollt finiog ar fy rhestr
rhwng cadernid Dyffryn yr Allorau
a meddalwch Dôl y Plu.
Hafn y Glo.
Rwy'n chwilio
ar ymylon adnabod
am stamp y rhedyn
sy'n estyn ei fysedd o'r oesoedd
cyn yr oes o'r blaen.
Hafn y Glo.
Rwy'n gwrando am arogl y gwlith,
neu chwiban y dihuno yn llinynnau'r awr
pan ddadweindiodd y ffidil las ei phen.
Hafn y Glo
a'i golau oer.
Hafn y Glo
yn fin, yn gledd,
yn gilfach cyfrinach
fel cof erioed.
Hafn y Glo.
Mae enw hŷn na hwn
mewn marwydos rhywle, sbo.
Hafn y Glo.
Mae'n dwyn fy anadl.
Russian Proverb / Ffordd lydan, ffordd gul

a wide road leads to war, a narrow path leads home

Come, Mother, come to the door,
tidy my hair with your comb;
a wide road leads to war,
a narrow path leads home.

Come, Mother, come, cry no more,
it’s time for your son to roam;
a wide road leads to war,
a narrow path leads home.

Come, Mother, come as before,
pray ’neath the whispering dome;
a wide road leads to war,
a narrow path leads home.

Come, Mother, tell me who tore
the page that said in the tome:
a wide road leads to war,
a narrow path leads home.

Oh, They tore the page, my Son,
They took it away to hide;
come home, the war is done,
and the path is coffin wide.
Dere, Mam fach, dere at y ford,
mae'r llestri yn disgwyl te -
ffordd lydan sy'n arwain at faes y gad,
ffordd gul sy'n dod tua thre.

Dere, Mam fach, dere at y drws,
criba fy ngwallt nôl i'w le -
ffordd lydan sy'n arwain at faes y gad,
ffordd gul sy'n dod tua thre.

Dere, Mam fach, a phaid llefen mwy,
rwy'n mynd, er na wn i i ble -
ffordd lydan sy'n arwain at faes y gad,
ffordd gul sy'n dod tua thre.

Dweda, Mam fach, pwy chwalodd y gair
mai cariad yw'r Duw sy'n y ne'? -
ffordd lydan sy'n arwain at faes y gad,
ffordd gul sy'n dod tua thre.

Nhw chwalodd y gair â chelwydd, fy Mab,
arweinwyr y dillad parch,
mae'r rhyfel ar ben, der' adre fy Mab,
ar y ffordd sydd mor llydan ag arch.
Beam / Llygedyn

What is the forest but a twig? – And the great
cold snow? Only a flake.
And all the world? A beam
Of God's light in the mind of man.
Trans: Tim ap Hywel
Beth yw'r goedwig ond brigyn? – A'r eira
mawr oer? Dim ond plufyn.
A'r byd i gyd? Llygedyn
O olau Duw ym meddwl dyn.

Mererid Hopwood

- Wales, United Kingdom, -

Poetry

Winter / Gaeaf

Coming Undone / Datod

/ Wedi Cad Coludd ar Ddrain

Brixton Jail, 1918 / (Untitled)

Hafn y Glo / Hafn y Glo

Russian Proverb / Ffordd lydan, ffordd gul

Beam / Llygedyn