Sunset - Looking from  Pen y Bryn across

 the Lafan Sands towards Llanfaes

Yn olau uwch Garth Celyn - hen obaith

Sy’n Abergwyngregyn,

Ac fe ddychwel Llywelyn

Yn barhaus i Ben y Bryn.

Tudur Dylan Jones (2001)

 ‘Tre Lywelyn’    The Home of Llywelyn

Lest the long lassitude should take up arms,

Lest Aber create hope,

It was set on fire from the floors to the roof,

With scorn, and stripped of its timbers;

They laid low all its beams

In rubble and abased it.

On the brave yesterday, the sledgehammer came,

Our warfare was broken in fragments

Crowbars ripped up the foundations

Our living was defaced, that there might not be

A dry wall or solid corners

Left standing of our resistance.

An ancient home destroyed,

An ancient dream pickaxed from remembrance;

In the long saga of our languishing

Oblivion covers the narrow walls

Till it flings the summer over the hill,

Blots out the sun of the two Llywelyns.

A country is unseen,

Without slates or stones any more

To keep us; we are speckled beasts

Without guts to stay the course, without strength

A hollow sound, a slack smile:Pet lambs, round-bellied, cheerful.

But by burrowing under the sod

We shall clean away the ancient traces;

Under the skin of the land, the memory is kept

Of the stone upon stone that was there.

And under lime we shall push the chisel

According to the length of Llywelyn’s home.

   Ar ben tomen, mae un tŵr

   Yn gadarn, a hwn geidw’r

   Wrogaeth yng Ngwyngregyn;

   Creu caer y mae’r cerrig hyn

   Rhag rwydd roi’r gorau iddi,

   Rhag ildio I’n hildio ni.

At the top of a mound one tower

Is firm, and this keeps fealty in Gwyngregyn;

These stones create a fort

Against giving up easily,

Against surrendering to our surrender.

                             Myrddin ap Dafydd (1991)

(translation from the Welsh by Dr, Gweneth Lilly)

‘Siwan’

Wasn’t the dancing on the lawn delightful?

The lords of France were pleased.

I heard one of them marveling to find

The dances of Aquitaine on a mead in Arfon.

                           ‘Siwan’ Saunders Lewis (1954)

Aber, Neu Aber Gwyn Gregin

O Aber! mae d’enw mor swynol i’m henaid,

O’m calon y’th garaf tra bwyf yn y byd,

Dy lethrau dryfrithir â gwaith ein hynafiaid,-

Gwrthgloddiau a chaerau a chestyll tra chlyd.

Eu-bannawg fynddau- noddfâu yr hen Gymry

Sy’n orwych ymgodi i’r cymyl di ri’,-

Y Llwydmor a’r Bere, mynyddoedd anwylgu,

Sy’n addurn i’r Aber i brofi ei bri,

Ac yno mae palas yr hen dywysogion

Fu’n llywio y Cymry er’s cannoedd cyn hyn,-

Llywelyn Fawr enwog – hen Gymro twym-galon,

A Dafydd ein brenin fu’n byw’m Mhenybryn.

          Hu Eryri. Glan Traeth Wylofain (Hugh Hughes, Aber)

(‘Cymru’  O.M. Edwards 1893)

The following is not a poem, but a worthwhile addition.

Abergwyngregyn          Aber Garth Celyn

Mae’n eithaf tebyg fod prif gartref y tywysogion

Llywelyn Fawr, Dafydd ap Llywelyn yr Ail (sef y Llyw Olaf)

ar safle hen dŷ Pen y Bryn.

Gwynfor Evans (2001)

 ©