Wales/Cymru

Wales

And now I live in Wales.
I’ve been here for thirty years.

I’ve visited the bleak uplands
where my people scratched their living.
I’ve seen worn headstones :
‘Ffarwel blant a ffarwel briod,
Ffarwel bopeth yn y byd.’
I know the names of Llywelyn,
Glyndôr, and even Mary Jones.

‘Ah, but you’re not really Welsh, are you ?’
says some Smith or Brown from Treorchy,
whose grandfather followed the coal in nineteen-ten.

But I don’t really mind.
I’m different: I’m a Cockney.

Cymru

A nawr dwi’n byw yng Nghymru.
Wedi bod yma dros drideg o flynyddoedd.

Dwi wedi ymweld â’r ucheldiroedd llwm
lle grafodd fy mhobl fywoliaeth.
Dwi wedi gweld yr hen gerrig beddau :
‘Farewell children and farewell wife,
Farewell everything in the world.’
Dwi’n adnabod yr enwau Llywelyn,
Glyndŵr a hyd yn oed Mari Jones.

‘Ond nid Cymro, go iawn dych chi ?’
meddai rhyw Smith neu Brown o Dreorchi,
disgynydd un o’r gweithwyr a ddilynodd y glo ym mil naw deg.

Ond does dim ots ’da fi.
Dwi’n wahanol. Cockney ydw i.

[Translated by the Welsh by Joyce James]