The Cravings Of A Welshman

Oh rampant pains
of a drunken Welshman
as he prowled the streets
for a simple Englishman.
To pick his bones
and lob the stones,
into pools of choir
as Myfanwy groans.

The ale and laver
does hwyl his soul,
from Felinfoel
to fields of coal.
On Burry Port
and Pembrey shores,
the Welshman
knows his cockle chores.
Gwenllian walks in Kidwelly mun,
without her head,
beyond the sun.

Cymru! Wales!
Where bards run riot
The cawl is deep
the lovespoons quiet.
Long he sleeps
on Merlin's hill,
the wizard's Welsh
stirred Bennett's Phil.

Dragon red
lift claw in pride,
three feathers comb
the pride inside.
No fear breaks
the soul of man,
storms lay shattered
by cwtches hand.

Wales! Cymru!
Ancient Celts,
mother's tongue
on dafodil belts.
Sing of old
as sing we must,
the Cymru tribes
of Swansea dust...

©Steven Francis poems 2013

Seamus Heaney: A Huge Loss

As soon as my tea stained eyes fell upon these words, "Seamus Heaney, the Nobel Prize-winning Irish poet and playwright, has died," my heart gave a heave of sadness. Oh my words, what dreadful news to be met with after only a few clicks of the mouse. Especially for a fellow poet/playwright (though not as grand to put myself on Heaney's level) who looked on the Irish writer as a kind of Obi Wan Kenobi figure. One of the last living Master (capitol M) Scribe. What wretched news!
Life, you can be a swine at the best of times but today? Today you are double the pig.
I was fortunate enough to spend time with Seamus Heaney at a poetry reading in Swansea University back in 1998, and it was like being in the presence of someone who knew all the tricks. It was immense, like a film fan meeting Clint Eastwood if you changed the Arts. Believe me, you know when you are in the company of a great man, something in your spirit alerts you, and it was certainly true back in the Taliesin center all those years ago in Swansea.

'Tis a black day, losing such a genius poet when real poets are so rare in this world. I'll take leave to mourn and leave you with words by Seamus himself:

"Be advised my passport's green.
No glass of ours was ever raised
to toast the Queen."

Welcome to the (Death) Party

Cin Cin?

A wise poet once said, "do not dance on your enemies grave, for tomorrow your friend dies." The people planning on holding 'death parties' in celebration of Margaret Thatchers death would do well to heed these words. Its perfectly monstrous to think that human beings could stoop so low as to want to raise a glass to a fellow humans passing. How low can ye go? Baroness Thatcher might not have been everyones cup of tea (to say the least) but at the end of the day, this was a very ill 87 year lady who has left us and it is hardly time for celebration. Not if you fancy keeping a shred of humanity and dignity.
The time for cheering was when Lady T resigned. All the hatred aimed at her in life has no purpose now but to serve anger itself because she is in her eternal sleep of jewelled flowers and golden tea, where drafts of rage can no longer touch her. And considering how the Iron Lady would have swatted any petty criticism aside like a tiger toying with a shrew when she was alive, I cannot think how these foul sounding 'death parties' will be anything other than proof of how low man can sink. Only the most ignorant and stupid will gain a scrap of joy from popping a cork over a coffin.
And these are generally the liberal types who have the gall to call me barbaric for supporting the death penalty! Listen, the next time you fellows accuse me (and the Conservatives) of being uncaring, cruel and evil, Mr Jakes will remind them of this behaviour.

The Other Thomas

Poet R.S. Thomas

On this Good Friday, we also celebrate 100 years since the birth of R.S. Thomas, one of Wales' greatest poets. (He was also an Anglican priest.) It has been said that Thomas found communicating with God hard, indeed many even thought him an athiest but I think this is to miss the point completely. Read his works and you will soon discover that Thomas used his poetry to reveals his 'version' of God. A God that shows Himself in small doses if you will, through nature which was featured heavily in his beautiful work.
Work, that much like my own poetry, was not written with a solid idea or agenda in mind before putting pen to paper, but words and imagery that unfolded as soon as he wrote. What I like to call 'living poetry'. It really is a joy to read.

Night Sky by R.S. Thomas

What they are saying is
that there is life there, too:
that the universe is the size it is
to enable us to catch up.

They have gone on from the human:
that shining is a reflection
of their intelligence. Godhead
is the colonisation by mind

of untenanted space. It is its own
light, a statement beyond language
of conceptual truth. Every night
is a rinsing myself of the darkness

that is in my veins. I let the stars inject me
with fire, silent as it is far,
but certain in its cauterising
of my despair. I am a slow

traveller, but there is more than time
to arrive. Resting in the intervals
of my breathing, I pick up the signals
relayed to me from a periphery I comprehend.

Hell is...Soggy Chips & Television

Being a poet/writer I occasionaly get asked if I believe in hell and damnation, (like I have been let in on some great secret only revealed to bards or philosophers) and often people are suprised by my answer because its so simple; no I don't believe in it. And furthermore I doubt the majority believe in it either. Hell is merely threat used by religious brigands to keep the congregation shaking in their pews.
Good thing too because if there was such a place, we'd all be heading there. Are we not all without sin? Also the infinite punishment of eternal damnation isn't exactly fair to be put upon earlthy sin. Is any crime committed in this world, worthy of such a punishment in the next?** And what type of loving God would impose it? Not a caring, forgiving one id wager.
If there is a hell, we are in it in this world. The wars, bloodshed, famines, this planet can seem like Vlad's 'forest of impalement' if looked from the right angle. Even lesser evils like soggy chips swimming in grease and reality television contribute to the endless woes suffered by humanity. (The thinking types among us).

** Jorge Luis Borges suggests in his essay La Duración del Infierno that no transgression can warrant an infinite punishment on the grounds that there is no such thing as an 'infinite transgression'.

A Poet On Death Row

I may get the wrong type of reader interested in this new blog thanks to that title but not to matter, its a wonderful title, conjuring up such vivid images of both gentle worlds and rough. But titles isn't not what brings me here tonight. Death is, as usual.
You see I feel as if im sitting on death row. Well not sitting exactly, im wandering around my green fields in West Wales as free as the proverbial bird (or should that be lamb?) but I am also in the shadow of the valley of death. I realise we all are of course, most however do not think about it almost constantly. And most do not have drinking and dietry habits to rival mine. Habits which daily get me closer than most to the fabled reaper. (Im not complaining, im willing to pay that price.)
For so long have my thoughts been dipped into the inky wells of death that like death row inmates you sometimes read about, im actually used to it. The End when it comes wont really be frightening or daunting because I feel like ive been preparing for it for ages. (And I have.)


Just you and me kid

Obviously im not looking forward to it but dying is not the terrible ogre to me that it seems to be to others. I look at it like a field trip where I shall discover lots of strange, new creatures and hope the 'SNIP' which cuts my celestial cord from this world isn't too uncomfortable.
I could face a physician (or hanging judge) who had grim news with all the nonchalance of giving a blood sample. I almost expect it.