Song of the Day - 1st March

Happy March! March Hares! Does anyone else remember being told to say March Hares instead of White Rabbits on the 1st March, or is that a local peculiarity?

No matter, it is March! Spring is approaching fast. The daffodils are blossoming, the sun is shining and although it is still chilly, the warmer weather will be here before we know it.

The 1st of March is of course St. David's Day - the patron saint of Wales. It commemorates the date of St. David's death in 589 AD.

Traditional festivities include wearing daffodils and leeks, recognised symbols of Wales and Saint David, respectively, eating traditional Welsh food including cawl, and women wearing traditional Welsh dress. An increasing number of cities and towns across Wales, including Cardiff, Swansea, and Aberystwyth also put on parades throughout the day.

St. David is the only patron saint of the four countries that make up the UK who was actually born in the country which celebrates him. St. Andrew wasn't Scottish, St George wasn't English and St. Patrick wasn't Irish. But St. David  (Welsh: Dewi Sant) was born in Caerfai, southwest Wales into an aristocratic family. He was reportedly a scion of the royal house of Ceredigion, and founded a Celtic monastic community at Glyn Rhosyn (The Vale of Roses) on the western headland of Pembrokeshire (Welsh: Sir Benfro) at the spot where St David's Cathedral stands today.

It is ironic then that I struggled to find a single public domain poem about him. I scoured the internet and even asked Welsh colleagues if they knew of any, to no avail. So I settled for using a beautiful poem about Wales, "Invocation to the Summer to Visit Glamorganshire", written by Welsh poet Dafydd ap Gwilym.

Dafydd ap Gwilym (c. 1340 - c. 1400) was the son of Gwilym Gam, of Brogynin, in the parish of Llanbadarn Fawr, Cardiganshire. He was said to be of illustrious lineage, and of handsome person.  His poetical talent and personal beauty procured him the favourable notice of the fair sex; which, however, occasioned him much misfortune.  His attachments were numerous, and one to Morvydd, the daughter of Madog Lawgam, of Niwbwrch, in Anglesea, a Welsh chieftain, caused the bard to be imprisoned.  This lady was the subject of a great portion of the bard’s poems.  Dafydd ap Gwilym has been styled the Petrarch of Wales.  He composed some 260 poems, most of which are sprightly, figurative, and pathetic.  The late Arthur James Johnes, Esq., translated the poems of Dafydd ap Gwilym into English which were published by Hooper, Pall Mall, in 1834.

This song is being Beta Tested by my friends at City of Canterbury Chamber Choir.

Invocation to the Summer to Visit Glamorganshire

By Dafydd Ap Gwilym

Where he spent many happy years at the hospitable mansion of Ivor Hael.  The bard, speaking from the land of Wild Gwynedd, or North Wales, thus invokes the summer to visit the sweet pastoral county of Glamorgan with all its blessings:

And wilt thou, at the bard’s desire,

Thus in thy godlike robes of fire,

His envoy deign to be?

Hence from Wild Gwynedd’s mountain land,

To fair Morganwg Druid strand,

Sweet margin of the sea.

Oh! may for me thy burning feet

With peace, and wealth, and glory greet,

My own dear southern home;

Land of the baron’s, halls of snow!

Land of the harp! the vineyards glow,

Green bulwark of the foam.

She is the refuge of distress;

Her never-failing stores

Have cheer’d the famish’d wilderness,

Have gladden’d distant shores.

Oh! leave no little plot of sod

’Mid all her clust’ring vales untrod;

But all thy varying gifts unfold

In one mad embassy of gold:

O’er all the land of beauty fling

Bright records of thy elfin wing.

From this scene of ecstacy, he makes a beautiful transition to the memory of Ivor, his early benefactor: still addressing the summer, he says,

Then will I, too, thy steps pursuing,

From wood and cave,

And flowers the mountain-mists are dewing,

The loveliest save;

From all thy wild rejoicings borrow

One utterance from a heart of sorrow;

The beauties of thy court shall grace

My own lost Ivor’s dwelling-place.